Profile of Kupe Village in Kieta

Leonard Fong Roka

The Kupe Mountains is positioned in the centermost part of the central area of the major Bougainville mountain backbone in the hinterland of the former provincial capital, Arawa, the Crown Prince Range. The lagoon-shaped valley is infested with rugged slopes and gigantic boulders; wild waterfalls and brawling rivers, cool mountain views towards the east coastal plains where one sees Arawa, the Arawa bay and the lowers villages like Topinang and so on, satisfies a weary traveler here.

 

The main river that cuts through Arawa, Bovong River, has its sources in this high altitude homestead.

From oral records, the first settlers of these mountains were the warring maangta (a clan in Bougainville that has its totem as the hornbill) clansmen. These people first settled on a spot called Bobakuu and began trading with the outsiders further south-east like Karakung area in the Kieta harbor for clay pots, duku (shell money) that came from Malaita.

Towards the east the Kupe people traded for bows and arrows, toraa (traditional weaved bag) with the Ioro people (Panguna) that is a hill walk to the west.

This trade routes resulted in the arrival of the Basikang (clan with the mairobe (a bigger species of lizards) clan marrying the maangta)) from the Panguna area and settling in the Kupe mountains. Thus today, the main clans in order of population in Kupe are the maangta, Basikang, Bakoringku and Barapang. 

The first Europeans to reach Kupe were the missionaries in the early 1900s. They introduced Christianity that the Kupe people still hold today; after them came the colonial administration from its base at Kieta harbor since 1905.

The Germans and later the Australians took many of the young men to walk in the Kekereka (now Arawa) plantation along others from south Bougainville. In the 1929 gold was discovered in the backyard of Kupe and Europeans became residence in Kupe. More cash economy flourished amongst the people that after its closure around 1937 led to more men looking for work in the plantations.

Before independence of PNG, more people from the Kupe were educated by the mission run schools. This lot of mostly young men ended in the work force of the Conzinc Riotinto mining in Panguna and other sectors in the then economically booming Bougainville.

After 1975 the interest in education faded since the government made no attempt to bring services like roads into the mountains. Despite the fact that the most of Kupe was under the special mining lease (SML) of the BCL, roads did not reach the people.

The Kupe Mountains today is made up of four main villages that are Nengkenaro, Sirona, Debereke and Turampa (the source of the Bovong River). This rugged land has a population of approximately 10 thousand people.

In 1988 they were some of the very first people to support the late Francis Ona to uphold militancy to shut the Panguna mine and remove the PNG squatter settlements in the outskirts of Arawa that abused them daily (my new book, ‘Brokenville’ captures a few moments of this).

Through the duration of the crisis Kupe did produce some notorious killers for the BRA and had being loyal to the independence movement. Today they still remain optimistic of the ABG and the PNG influence on the ABG.

Having faced a long drought from quick access to vital services like roads since the 1970s that only reached the low-lying villages beneath their mountains, the Kupe people engaged on bringing their primary school right into the mountains as off 1998.

They slowly revived the old Kupe Gold Mine and fundraised to raise their money to purchase roofing iron and other materials from the coast in Arawa. Hired trunks then drove all the materials to Kaino village where human strength brought them on a walk that takes three hours through rugged terrain and wild merciless river systems.

In 2007 the school graduated its first Grade 8 class of some 16 students.

With the high labor gold panning works improving lifestyle also has being changing rapidly. Sago palm thatched houses had faded with new roofing iron taking the course. Nearly all families have a small canteen selling a few goods like soap, rice, tinned meat, clothes and so on to the public. But again cargo comes up here on the shoulders of the people.

To cater for this exercise, there are groups that were formed for hire to carry cargo and so on from the nearest car-stop, the Kaino village. Any individual or businessman that wants his work done books one or more of these groups for an amount of money, most charge a K100.

In 2012, however, to bring four-wheel drive vehicles closer home, the people began to dig their own road from Kaino. So far, the heavy Land Cruisers cannot use the road but only the lighter Toyota Hilux is helping a little.

The digging is still continuing from the estimated 2 kilometers done so far.