HISTORY
Archeological evidence indicates
that humans arrived on New Guinea at least 60,000 years ago, probably
by sea from Southeast Asia during an Ice Age period when the sea
was lower and distances between islands shorter. Although the
first arrivals were hunters and gatherers, early evidence shows
that people managed the forest environment to provide food. There
also are indications of gardening having been practiced at the
same time that agriculture was developing in Mesopotamia and Egypt.
Early garden crops--many of which are indigenous--included sugarcane,
Pacific bananas, yams, and taros, while sago and pandanus were
two commonly exploited native forest crops. Today's staples--sweet
potatoes and pigs--are later arrivals, but shellfish and fish
have long been mainstays of coastal dwellers' diets.
When Europeans first arrived,
inhabitants of New Guinea and nearby islands--while still relying
on bone, wood, and stone tools--had a productive agricultural
system. They traded along the coast, where products mainly were
pottery, shell ornaments, and foodstuffs, and in the interior,
where forest products were exchanged for shells and other sea
products.
The first Europeans to sight
New Guinea were probably the Portuguese and Spanish navigators
sailing in the South Pacific in the early part of the 16th century.
In 1526-27, Don Jorge de Meneses accidentally came upon the principal
island and is credited with naming it "Papua," a Malay
word for the frizzled quality of Melanesian hair. The term "New
Guinea" was applied to the island in 1545 by a Spaniard,
Ynigo Ortis de Retez, because of a fancied resemblance between
the islands' inhabitants and those found on the African Guinea
coast. Although European navigators visited the islands and explored
their coastlines for the next 170 years, little was known of the
inhabitants until the late 19th century.
New
Guinea
With Europe's growing need for coconut oil, Godeffroy's of Hamburg,
the largest trading firm in the Pacific, began trading for copra
in the New Guinea Islands. In 1884, Germany formally took possession
of the northeast quarter of the island and put its administration
in the hands of a chartered company. In 1899, the German imperial
government assumed direct control of the territory, thereafter
known as German New Guinea. In 1914, Australian troops occupied
German New Guinea, and it remained under Australian military control
until 1921. The British Government, on behalf of the Commonwealth
of Australia, assumed a mandate from the League of Nations for
governing the Territory of New Guinea in 1920. It was administered
under this mandate until the Japanese invasion in December 1941
brought about the suspension of Australian civil administration.
Following the surrender of the Japanese in 1945, civil administration
of Papua as well as New Guinea was restored, and under the Papua
New Guinea Provisional Administration Act, 1945-46, Papua and
New Guinea were combined in an administrative union.
Papua
On November 6, 1884, a British protectorate was proclaimed over
the southern coast of New Guinea (the area called Papua) and its
adjacent islands. The protectorate, called British New Guinea,
was annexed outright on September 4, 1888. The possession was
placed under the authority of the Commonwealth of Australia in
1902. Following the passage of the Papua Act of 1905, British
New Guinea became the Territory of Papua, and formal Australian
administration began in 1906. Papua was administered under the
Papua Act until it was invaded by the Japanese in 1941, and civil
administration suspended. During the war, Papua was governed by
a military administration from Port Moresby, where Gen. Douglas
MacArthur occasionally made his headquarters. As noted, it was
later joined in an administrative union with New Guinea during
1945-46 following the surrender of Japan.
Postwar
Developments
The Papua and New Guinea Act of 1949 formally approved the placing
of New Guinea under the international trusteeship system and confirmed
the administrative union of New Guinea and Papua under the title
of "The Territory of Papua and New Guinea." The act
provided for a Legislative Council (established in 1951), a judicial
organization, a public service, and a system of local government.
A House of Assembly replaced the Legislative Council in 1963,
and the first House of Assembly opened on June 8, 1964. In 1972,
the name of the territory was changed to Papua New Guinea.
Elections in 1972 resulted
in the formation of a ministry headed by Chief Minister Michael
Somare, who pledged to lead the country to self-government and
then to independence. Papua New Guinea became self-governing in
December 1973 and achieved independence on September 16, 1975.
The 1977 national elections confirmed Michael Somare as Prime
Minister at the head of a coalition led by the Pangu Party. However,
his government lost a vote of confidence in 1980 and was replaced
by a new cabinet headed by Sir Julius Chan as Prime Minister.
The 1982 elections increased Pangu's plurality, and parliament
again chose Somare as Prime Minister. In November 1985, the Somare
government lost a vote of no confidence, and the parliamentary
majority elected Paias Wingti, at the head of a five-party coalition,
as Prime Minister. A coalition, headed by Wingti, was victorious
in very close elections in July 1987. In July 1988, a no-confidence
vote toppled Wingti and brought to power Rabbie Namaliu, who a
few weeks earlier had replaced Somare as leader of the Pangu Party.
Such reversals of fortune and a revolving-door succession of prime ministers have characterized Papua New Guinea's national politics. From 1988 to 2002, the country had numerous prime ministers. A plethora of political parties, coalition governments, shifting party loyalties, and motions of no confidence in the leadership all lent an air of instability to political proceedings. For the first 27 years of independence, a "first past the post" electoral system resulted in many parliamentarians elected with less than 15% of their constituency. Fractious politics and a 75% loss rate for incumbents precluded the development of strong political parties or a stable national leadership. Many hope that limited preferential voting, introduced in 2003, and an organic law on political parties will stabilize national politics.
In the 2002 elections, virtually the entire previous cabinet lost their seats. The government was formed by a coalition of several parties, and Sir Michael Somare, the leader of the National Alliance (and the nation's first Prime Minister in 1975), was elected Prime Minister. The 2007 elections returned Somare as Prime Minister. His government was the first to complete a 5-year term since independence.
