Melanesia in Review: Issues and Events, 2020

Abstract

Melanesia in Review:Issues and Events, 2020 Volker Boege (bio) Bougainville As in other parts of the world, politics and public life in Bougainville in 2020 were overshadowed by the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (covid-19) pandemic. In alignment with the course taken by the government of Papua New Guinea (GoPNG), the Autonomous Bougainville Government (abg) declared a pandemic-related state of emergency in Bougainville on 23 March 2020 (abg 2020a). Although Bougainville reported only two cases of covid-19 the whole year, the state of emergency, including corresponding restrictions on travel and public life, was extended several times and remained in place until the end of 2020. This affected political developments considerably. Elections for the Bougainville House of Representatives and the Bougainville president had to be postponed from May to August and September 2020, and consultations between the abg and GoPNG on the implementation of the results of the referendum on the future political status of Bougainville, which in December 2019 had resulted in a 97.7 percent vote for independence (Boege 2020), only made very slow progress. The state of emergency initially included a ban on all flights and ships coming to Bougainville, closure of the border to Solomon Islands, stay-at-home orders for the general public and nonessential staff of the Bougainville Public Service, restrictions on travel within the Autonomous Region of Bougainville (ARoB), closure of schools and markets, and bans on public gatherings, including sports, musical and other cultural events, and church services (abg 2020a). In the weeks following the emergency declaration, an Emergency Response Plan was elaborated, and an Emergency Response Team, several government committees, and a House of Representatives Emergency Committee were established. Public awareness initiatives were undertaken; hospitals in Buka, Arawa, and Buin made preparations; and an isolation facility, funded by the Australian government, was built. Activities were coordinated by a Joint Taskforce Agency and the Emergency Response Team. Officials, however, constantly complained about widespread and increasing violations of the emergency regulations (of which there were as many as twenty-nine): people crossing the Solomon Islands border by boat, open roadside markets and shops, overloading of public motor vehicles (the main means of transport in Bougainville), people coming together in large groups, and so on. There was an obvious discrepancy between the emergency regulations as laid down in writing and the reality on the ground. It is almost impossible to impose emergency restrictions in an environment like Bougainville. Over the course of the year, restrictions were gradually loosened, although the state of emergency remained in place. The harshest restrictions applied to travel into and out of the region. This [End Page 523] proved to be appropriate: the only two covid-19 cases in Bougainville were a student who had come back home from Port Moresby at the end of July and a Bougainville mine worker from the Lihir mine in Papua New Guinea (PNG) who had traveled back for family holidays in November (rnz 2020a; New Dawn 2020e). The covid-19 pandemic had serious political effects. Consultations between the GoPNG and the abg about the implementation of the referendum result of December 2019 could not proceed as planned. On 12 March 2020, immediately before the emergency declarations in PNG and the ARoB, a meeting of the Joint Supervisory Body (jsb), the high-level GoPNG-abg institution responsible for the Bougainville peace and referendum process, had agreed on an ambitious agenda for the referendum consultations. It resolved that the "Post Referendum joint consultation process commence soon after the abg 2020 elections" and that a "Post Referendum Inter-Government Consultation Process Framework," as well as several joint bodies, be set up for the process. Furthermore, it addressed funding commitments made by the GoPNG, acknowledged the successful completion of the Bougainville Weapons Disposal process, and resolved "to transfer all remaining powers and functions as provided in the bpa [Bougainville Peace Agreement] to the abg" (abg 2020c). Both sides were in agreement that it would only make sense to have substantial consultations after the establishment of a new abg, with elections originally planned for May 2020. With the covid-19 crisis, however, it became clear that elections would have to be postponed; hence, the post-referendum...