More aid is not the way to regain our regional influence

That is hardly surprising given PNGs serious fiscal problems, capacity constraints within the public sector, the breakdown of law and order and what I would regard as the "fragmentation" of the political party system.

In the forthcoming elections there will be FIFTY-TWO registered parties running! And for close to 120 electorates (provincial seats and district seats) there will be at least SIX THOUSAND candidates!

Just printing and distributing ballot papers alone presents a massive challenge in a nation where there is no national road network, and where upwards of 80 per cent of the people still live in remote communities connected principally by air and by sea.

Then there is the impact of PNGs comparatively low literacy rate - 60 per cent. Educating the people on how to vote, and other electoral process fundamentals, is difficult if not impossible in some areas.

At every national election since Independence in 1975 the Australian Government has provided substantial funding support, as well as logistical support, for PNG’s Electoral Commission. Similar support has been provided to other regional neighbours. This year that has included the printing of ballot papers. But our capacity to assist has been inevitably limited by the fact our own national elections (a massive logistical exercise) are being held at about the same time as PNG’s polls.

But there is one further obstacle to free, fair and transparent elections in PNG today. There has not been a total redistribution of electoral boundaries since the 1977 national elections - the first after independence was achieved in 1975.

The capacity of a very divided national parliament to agree to what is needed - a full redistribution following a total clean-up of the electoral roll is zero.

In the dying weeks of the last parliament legislation was rushed through creating a small number of additional seats principally by dividing existing electorates - a process that rightly raised widespread concerns,

We need to work with the next PNG Government, and Parliament, to have transparent reform of the whole democratic process, of which the national parliament is the key component.

And we need to work with other regional neighbours to address similar, though not of the same magnitude, issues in other regional neighbours.

We also need to fund our national parliament to implement more comprehensive partnership and "twinning" arrangements with regional parliaments.

Strengthening democracy in our region is something China cannot, and would not, do!