There are many ill-treatments of Bougainville and Bougainvilleans that is yet to be talked about to get people more aware of what actually happened in their past that eventually led them to suffer as they struggled against relegation from external infidels and infiltrators, a classical one is the puppet state of Papua New Guinea.
Professor James T. Griffin
Bougainville Facts
- Bougainvilleans are racially and culturally distinct to PNG redskins, except to the adjoining part of the Solomon Islands. Jet-black people and traditionally more Pacific
- Bougainvilleans returning from overseas contracts saw no economic opportunities awaiting them so in the 1930s cargo cult movements exploded
- A sense of neglect by Port Moresby developed, and even the expatriates saw it as a 'cinderalla' province of PNG
- In fact [Bougainville] was better off than most places, not only because of its natural endowments, but because of intensive Christian mission inputs into health and education
- In Bougainville, no administration run school existed until 1961 and it was established to benefit itinerant, non-Bougaoinvillean public servants
- The Australian administration under a policy of 'uniformed development' felt resources should be concentrated in needier places, such as the recently contacted PNG Highlands and the mainland. Bougainvilleans resisted, in 1962, they demonstrated before the United Nations mission in Kieta seeking a transfer of the UN mandate of the former German colony from Australia to the United States
- Coinciding with the first common-roll election which flagged Bougainville's integration, CRA entered, uninvited into the dissident Guava division in 1964. Resistance to exploration soon began, and police were used to consolidateCRA's presence
- The Australian attitude was based on the rule of enminent domain: Minerals belonged to the Crown. They were to be developed to benefit the people as a whole
Source: Niugini Nius 7 February 1990 (Focus)
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