But what actions will be taken?

Oseah Philemon

 

Three years and 10 months after a government committee looked into the gun issue in Papua New Guinea, Sir Michael Somare's government has finally tabled the committee’s report in Parliament.
Internal Security Minister Sani Rambi when tabling the report with its 244 recommendations admitted the country has a very serious gun problem that needs to be tackled as a matter of urgency. The widespread use of illegal guns throughout PNG has affected every sector of the nation.
Coffee growers in the Highlands no longer transport their coffee to the market for fear of being held up by criminals armed with deadly firearms.
Buyers no longer carry money with them on the road to buy coffee or other produce for the same reason.
Maternal and Child Health sisters no longer do their regular patrols to check on babies and mothers in the rural areas because of fear of being attacked by criminals armed with guns.
It is a never-ending story that has repeated itself so many times over the years throughout PNG. Yet governments have failed to do anything about it.
Of late, a Bank South Pacific branch in Madang was robbed of over K2 million cash by armed men after taking its senior management staff and their families hostage and holding them in a hotel more than 50 kilometres away from Madang town.
Now that the report has been tabled, what can the people of PNG expect? The challenge facing the Somare government today is whether it has the political will to tackle the gun culture that has almost crippled PNG.
Many innocent lives have been lost since Somare was given the guns report in September 2005.
He received the report and his cabinet accepted it including all the recommendations—but failed to implement their own decisions on it.
The tabling of the National Guns Control Committee Report is nothing for the Somare Government celebrate.
In fact they should be ashamed of themselves for failing to protect the lives and properties of Papua New Guineans by their failure to act on the recommendations of the report.
Many grassroots people who met the National Guns Control Committee want politicians to be the first to surrender their weapons before little people can surrender theirs. Will this happen? It remains to be seen.
As a result of the committee’s work, police and defence force personnel were out in full force in 2007 to prevent any use of illegal firearms in the last general election.
PNG’s next general election is in 2012 which gives the government ample time to take measures to reduce gun violence.
The gun campaign brought home many sad stories of how families have been affected by the use of guns in the wrong hands.
On a cool Highlands morning in the conference room of the Enga Provincial Government, former commander of the Papua New Guinea Defence Force, Major General Jerry Singirok, sat face to face with a group of mothers.
He went to the capital Wabag to talk to the people about the urgency of getting rid of illegal guns and returning peace and normalcy to the communities.
Enga, one of five highlands provinces, has been notorious for tribal fighting which has resulted in the loss of hundreds of human lives and destruction of properties worth thousands of kina.
On that morning, the 20 or so women who were in the room with Singirok all had one thing in common. They were all widows. Their husbands had been shot and killed in tribal fights. Their deaths were mostly from home-made guns produced in the Enga Province.
They recounted the pain and agony they were going through and how difficult it had become to raise children without fathers. There were school fees to be paid, clothes to be bought, medical care and all other daily necessities of families to be paid for.
Singirok was touched by the stories told to him. The message of what guns can do to the lives of families had hit him hard.
A military officer trained to kill with guns in times of war, he went to Wabag not as the former commander of the PNGDF but as chairman of the government-appointed National Guns Control Committee to gauge the views of the public about how best to deal with the serious gun problem facing PNG.
Vavine Gabi who witnessed her mother being shot at close range by criminals along the Magi Highway in the Central Province of PNG bears witness to the pain she and her family still suffer from that experience.
Gabi is now the vice-president of Coalition to Stop Gun Violence PNG, a non-government organisation committed to eradicating gun violence from PNG communities.
She recently attended the Small Arms in the Pacific Regional Meeting in Sydney to launch a coordinated regional approach to the implementation of the United Nations Small Arms Programme of Action (UNPoA).
The Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects, agreed upon by UN member states in July 2001, includes recommendations to curb the proliferation of small arms and light weapons.
In PNG, statistics compiled by the Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary show there is overwhelming evidence to suggest that most serious crimes reported over the last 20 to 25 years and more so in recent times has been exacerbated by the use of illegal firearms.
It is estimated that about 60% of all major crimes in PNG are gun related.
Amongst the three top categories of crime—robbery, break and entry and murder—at least 90% of those reported crimes are gun related.
“In other words, without firearms it is conceivable that crime rates could be much less than what has been reported so far,” said Bire Kimisopa, a former minister for internal security.