A hard drugs crisis is the last thing PNG needs

The IMF has offered Papua New Guinea a loan of just under US $1 billion.

Government comment on it has been muted. The daily press has today revealed why.

The IMF has imposed some heavy conditions on its loan.

The toughest is that PNG must devalue the Kina...probably substantially.

There has been a reluctance from successive governments to entertain devaluation.

It would make imports dearer, and probably further lower living standards.

Last week the PNG Government received a wake up call when it comes to hard drug running.

A light aircraft loaded with hard drugs worth $15 million was apprehended at Monto airport in Queensland where it had landed to refuel.

The aircraft began its trip in Bulolo, a community between Port Moresby and Lae.

Now fortunately PNG does not produce hard drugs, or we don't think it does.

So it has to be assumed the drugs were shipped from somewhere in Asia. One of those arrested was from China. Several were Australians. They all face long prison terms.

The AFP, Queensland Police, Border Force, and the PNG Police have done a highly professional job on this case.

But it does raise the question - have any other drug syndicates being successful?

The PNG police force is woefully underresourced.

My friend Jimmy Maladina is MP for a vast electorate in the Milne Bay Province. It comprises hundreds of islands, some inhabited. I guess Jimmy has 100,000 constituents.

For the WHOLE electorate he has just ONE police officer!

As Jimmy points out the seas between the islands are frequented by vessels travelling from the north to Australia.

One policeman would have zero capacity to monitor the dozens of yachts and boats moving across the vast area which had a key role in the Second World War where Australian and US forces successfully repelled the Japanese advance.

But how did the drugs get to Bulolo which is many kilometres from the coast?

Part of our success in World War Two was the support given by coastal communities along the northern coast.

One wonders if it might not be time to engage alert villagers to watch for unusual arrivals!

Some years ago I warned that our border with Papua is porous. One aircraft crash landed near Port Moresby when its cargo of cannabis was too heavy.

The other way drugs get to Australia is via boat travelling the short distance from the PNG mainland across the Torres Strait to Thursday Island and the Gulf.

Border force has reduced this route we hope. But vigilance is needed.

Moving from cannabis, grown in the Highlands, to hard drugs imported from Asia, and possibly South America, is a whole new challenge for PNG and Australia.

Speaking on Ray Hadley's radio programme on Sydney and Brisbane radio this week the highly articulate AFP Commissioner, Reece Kershaw, was full of praise for the PNG Police Commissioner, David Manning.

I share that view.

But David Manning and the force need our support - and they need it urgently.

As the IMF has revealed, the PNG Government is essentially broke.

The Albanese Government determined that our priority needed to be the PNG Defence Force, which has been in very poor shape and getting worse.

That clearly was of interest to China!

Fortunately the security agreement being negotiated between Australia and Papua New Guinea has curtailed China for now.

The focus needs to now shift to the police force under the leadership of David Manning.

We currently give PNG about $600 million in aid each year. Penny Wong has ordered a full review of our aid program, headed by aid to PNG.

The police force is under resourced and under enormous pressure - Street crime, ethnic outbreaks of violence especially in the Highlands.

It has an excellent Commissioner but he, and the good people of PNG, desperately need our help and that of New Zealand and the US.

We should co-ordinate it. It is in our Australian National Interest to do so.