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Hi Nabila, we will waive registration fees for those whose pitches are selected, but unfortunately we are unable to fund any other expenses associated with attending the conference.

Sam Koim and Stephen Howes can find no solution to how the royalties from the export of gas by the PNG LNG Project can be paid to the “landowners” at Hides. This is because the situation at Hides and in Port Moresby is almost a perfect storm, in which, in addition to those they discuss, a number seemingly unrelated circumstances have come together in a way which may ultimately cause the LNG project and the PNG Government severe difficulties. These include Huli social organisation and land tenure, the fraudulent distribution and massive theft of public money from the benefits agreement grants paid in Port Moresby to individuals representing themselves as Huli leaders in conjunction with allegations of kick-backs to those who approved the payments, the general incompetence of public service staff and their deep reluctance to visit or stay in the Hides area, a deep distrust of the banks by individuals at Hides who allege theft of money from their accounts by bank staff and the unwillingness of banks to open branches in the project area. I will comment on the social organisation and land tenure issue. Koim and Howes raise the matter of Social Mapping and Landowner Identification Studies. They are much misunderstood documents. These studies were undertaken by a Huli speaking anthropologist with a great deal of experience with Huli culture and practice and were an extension of studies undertaken for the Kutubu oilfield developments by Oil Search Ltd where they have been used successfully. Primarily, they identify, not individual land owners, because that is not possible, but the landowning groups that are found within a Petroleum Development Licence Area (PDLA) within which the project will occupy land and extract gas. These groups have become known universally as “clans”, which raises problems itself, because within PNG there is much misunderstanding of what a clan is. The boundaries of the PDLAs are grid squares of the international Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) coordinate system and are not congruent within Huli clan territory boundaries. Thus some clans may fall outside an area that is due to receive royalty payments by just a few meters. Huli landowners do not know where the PDLA boundaries fall in relation to their clan boundaries. This creates much anxiety among landowners. Oil Search Ltd community affairs staff mapped clan boundaries around its production gas well and gas-to-electricity facility at Hides in the 1990s. Esso Highlands Ltd did not accept that its field staff should do similar boundary mapping within the LNG area on the grounds that it was the government’s responsibility to do it (which it is). The Huli owners of the PDLAs within which the PNG LNG operates organise themselves in a way that many other PNGeans find difficult to grasp because it differs from what they are familiar with. Other PNG highlanders in particular, are commonly confused and even disparaging of, Huli social organisation and land tenure. The Huli “clan” is known as a hameigini. The Huli clan territory, that is the land, is also known as a hameigini. The boundaries of Huli clan land are usually clearly identified by deep ditches and are not often disputed. Where the land is disputed, the dispute is usually related to how the people who presently occupy the land are classified, how they classify themselves, or over what sort of rights they have to occupy the land. People can claim membership of a clan by direct descent from a male, their father or grandfather and so on. People who can do this are called tene. Tene are the primary clan members. As long as they can demonstrate their descent by citing genealogical evidence that is agreed to as being sound by other tene members, their membership and their occupation of land belonging to their clan cannot be contested. Tene clan members can make their land available to non-tenes to occupy or use, especially relatives from other parts of Hela. People may also claim membership of a clan through a female, their mother or grandmother for example, who will be the daughter of a tene clan member. Clan members who do this are known as yamuwine. An individual is yamuwine, even if he traces his descent from a very distant female ancestor. An individual yamuwine clan member who participates fully in clan activities such as fights and exchanges, who contributes generously pigs and food to funerals and compensations, and who proves to be a wise and strategic leader, can become known as “just like a tene”. Nevertheless, should he come into dispute over clan land with a tene clan member, he will remain at a disadvantage, because a tene member has primary rights which will usually not be able to be overridden by a yamuwine member. Over a number of generations, whole groups of people who trace their descent from a yamuwine ancestor, come to be known as yamuwine sub-clans or even yamuwine clans. Such groups cannot deal with their land without consulting with the tene clan that they emerged from a number of generations ago. A common cause of a dispute and sometimes vicious fighting is a yamuwine clan or sub-clan declaring itself tene and adopting tene rights over the land it occupies. On the other hand, a tene clan may decide to treat a yamuwine group as “just like tene”. A third level of clan membership are known as wali haga. They may be relatives wives or friends. A tene or a long time yamuwine clan member can invite such people to come and reside within the clan land and to grow food there. This sort of social organisation has a number of implications: an individual who is tene in one clan can be yamuwine in another. He can legitimately occupy and use land in more than one clan territory. In the past many men had more than one residence. A study of a clan near Tari in the 1950s found 40% of males had at least one additional residence outside the clan land. This had fallen to 20% by 1978. Two major advantages of more than one residence were first, the ability to make gardens in more than one environment and second, to have a place of refuge in the case of a fight gone wrong. Nowadays, an additional advantage is the ability to move to a clan territory within a PDLA that will receive payments from royalties from a clan territory that is outside a PDLA and so will receive nothing. The emergence of yamuwine clans has other implications when payments of royalties are considered. The tene landowners will attempt to be the recipients of the payments and will want to redistribute a share to the yamuwine sub-clans. The yamuwine members will resent this and may try to reclassify themselves as tene, often seen by tene members, as a very provocative thing to do. A very important implication of this situation is that it is all but impossible for an outsider to determine the clan membership of any particular individual. Even for clan members, membership of some individuals and groups is arguable, and the Huli spend a lot of time debating just such matters. In the circumstance of a large amount of money about to come to one group and not to another, to ask an individual which clan they are a member of is extremely unreliable. Clan and individual histories may be fabricated, clan leaders may not know the history of their occupation of particular land and individuals whose ancestors moved to a clan territory several generations ago may not be able demonstrate their rights to be in occupation, or may make them up. Other than long, drawn out public debates, many of which come to no agreement anyway, membership of Huli landowning groups cannot be determined. In addition, identifying land owners once is just the beginning of the task for outside administrators. Clan members are born and die or are adopted in, every day so to properly keep track of who are clan members will require continual monitoring. This situation has been understood by Lands and Community Affairs staff contracted to Esso Highlands Ltd since the beginning of the project but their advice that the government would almost certainly be unable to identify landowners to receive royalty payments was not understood by senior managers. If it is not possible to identify individual landowners, how can royalties be paid to landowners? Koim and Howes raise the possibility of using Incorporated Land Groups (ILGs). In addition to the requirements to register an ILG listed by them, an individual can only be registered as a member of one ILG, a restriction that is totally unsuitable to Huli. This is one reason why ILGs were not previously used to register Huli landowners. At Hides, landowners repeatedly say they will accept royalty payments made to clan representatives, (“clan agents”) as long as the payments are made in cash and in public, so that everybody can see who receives the money and can know how much they received. They say any other form of payment is open to fraudulent dealings and theft by public servants, clan leaders and politicians. The recent history of payments made in Port Moresby under the Development Grants and the Business Development Grants of the LNG USBA and LSBA suggests they are right to be concerned. This approach was used to pay a K243,000 deprivation grant to the landowners of the Komo airfield. The clans owning the land and their agents were identified by EHL community affairs staff as part of an extended mapping exercise before construction of the airfield began. The cash was placed in large envelopes and as the name of the clan was called out, the cash was removed from the envelope and shown to the watching clan members, then placed back in the envelope and given to the agent. By the end of the payment, clans members had formed groups and cash was being distributed to them by the agents. Lands and Community Affairs field staff visited the areas affected in the days after the payment and sought complaints from people who believed they had not received a fair share. The only complaint received was from a man in Port Moresby who demanded he be paid there. His clan agent said he had been away from Komo for many years and had not contributed to the clan’s affairs and so would not receive a share. Such payments are allowed under the O&G Act. This was a much smaller exercise than that which will be required to pay royalties, where many more clans are involved. The biggest problem with the Komo payment was the maintenance of security over a large amount of cash being moved within easy access of heavily armed criminal gangs located elsewhere in Hela, and in Southern Highlands and Western Highlands.

Is it funded? I am in pakistan.if it will be fully funded i would love to attend

Excellent, as far as it goes (the full version of criminal misbehaviour, fraud, violence, deceit etc etc in the PNG resources sector would be longer than the Encyclopedia Britannica). However your reference to the judicial Alternative Dispute Resolution scam drew my attention. This is a very clear example of the judicial corruption evident in Papua New Guinea, and warrants investigation. There are a number of variations on the theme, and more than one judge is involved.

Great links team. A quick comment on writing to politicians. Often people assume they can bang out a quick email and their local member will read it personally. Unfortunately this is not the case as MPs receive '000s of emails every single day. This is a <a href="https://www.oxfam.org.au/get-involved/campaign-with-us/diy-campaigning/make-your-mp-work-for-you/writing-to-your-mp/" rel="nofollow">good DIY guide from Oxfam</a> on things to consider so your email stands out from the crowd. Also, if you want your email read, I'd recommend writing to your local MP instead of the relevant Minister. Often Minister's correspondence gets automatically forwarded onto the public service and bulk standard replies will be returned. This can be a frustrating process. Local MPs have a greater incentive, particularly in marginal seats, to respond to local concerns and pass along their feedback to Cabinet Ministers and other political leaders. They also get prioritised when they forward on correspondence to their Ministerial colleagues. Try and get a couple of your friends in the same electorate to also write an email on the same topic (but not a standard response) and this will amplify your message.

Are you going to be there January 2017?

A very informative and accurate analysis. Justice will be served even if delayed for the sake of the poor and those who are deprived of the basic services. Thanks Countryman for speaking out.

Hi John, thank you for reinforcing the point that these setbacks are not only for the ITFS but the People of PNG. This was an important point the courts were invited to consider in their deliberation.

Thank you Dorothy. I agree with your thoughts re Police Commissioner. The very institution of justice hangs on an impartial police force. Any political interference poses the greatest threat to a functioning society under rule of law.

Thanks Mark. It is a big question whether or not ICAC will be as effective as the Task Force Sweep. Justice Ellis hopefully understands the expectation.

Thanks Bal Your account of the PM case is very informative that even a lay man can draw his/her own conclusion. It was a case unprecedented in the history of PNG. It can be well explained in the context of traditional PNG way how problem is created and how one goes to the extreme of protecting him/herself and their clan or tribes. Relating to your commentary: The setbacks faced not only by ITFS team but also the owners of the public offices (PNGans) would very much like the court to consider: (1) national interest; (2) make decisions not only within the confine of the letter of law but beyond within the spirit of the law; (3) seriously consider prevailing circumstances of the events that unfold in the spirit of neutrality vs apprehension of biasness and (4) public institutions are for everyone’s benefit and not for one or a few individuals. All in all, justice should prevail in all courses. What is known in the public domain with regard to your account are; 1. Police Commissioners-the preceding and current were purposely appointed to disrupt and dismantle the Police Fraud Squad Office which was working directly with ITFS 2. The former AG was suspended and a new one appointed purposely to protect the NEC Chairman and the question of brief out to private lawyers by ITFS would not succeed 3. The NEC decision to disband ITFS and not to be reviewed by court was not for communal/national interest but to serve one or few individuals 4. In the public institutions those officers trying to serve or contribute to justice are seen to be given marching orders and where instances of biasness arose they tended to be getting permanent stay While we respect all court decisions on the case with PM, we would like to see the honorable court of this lands fully exercise its inherent power to do justice in circumstances where injustice would otherwise arise.

Bal, very good analytical paper. Well done. Legislative and institutional reforms are required, as you rightly pointed out, if PNG is serious in fighting against corruption and rid it to make way for genuine development . Police Commissioner's terms, for instance, should be legislated properly so that he/she serves without fear or favor. The police force's constitutional mandate is to preserve peace & good order in the country and enforce the laws in an impartial and objective manner. The Commissioner is the head of this force and as such, his term of employment ought to protected. Only then can he be able to perform his role impartially (ethics, integrity and principles aside), and not serve a certain group of people. Appointment process and committee perhaps also needs review.