The political class conspired, without any popular say-so, to bring in refugees and migrants, a troublesome percentage of which are unlikely ever to assimilate. Now they compound their first sin with the slander that intolerance of newcomers is the real offence.
It was between mid and end January in 1980. My first child was three months old. It was in the early hours. I was in bed with my wife; my daughter in her crib. I lived in Tokarara, a suburb of Port Moresby. My street was a cul-de-sac, which ended in dense bush. All of the other houses were occupied by Paua New Guinean families. Probably, the father in each household was a senior public servant, as was I in the Department of Finance.
All of the houses were single-standing, quite large fibro cement structures on stilts, with louvered windows. I awoke to a racket next door. I walked to the living area and peered out of a window.
The lights were all on in the house and I could see plainly the family cowering at one end in a bedroom. Six or seven members (I can’t be sure exactly) of a so-called “rascal gang” were milling around inside the house.
One of their number broke off and ran to my house. He had a large-blade panga knife and began hacking through the wall. He was sweating profusely and shaking. The phone lines which ran under the house had been cut. No mobile phones in those days folks.
My wife was now up and I told her to put water on the stove. Throw boiling water on the bastards, I thought. I kid you not, Quasimodo (played by Charles Laughton in the movie) came to mind.
I was looking down through a louvered window, only three feet or so from his face. “Fuck-off, you black bastard!” I shouted forcefully without the least tremor. Miracles happen. He ran way shouting “White bastards!” Evidently, I surmise, the intimidatory power of being white in PNG was not yet gone. The police eventually arrived, long after the rascals had skedaddled. I am not sure how they were alerted to what had happened. The people next door went back to their village, leaving their house vacant.
My spurt of courage — or adrenalin flow, or whatever it was — had evaporated by the time daylight broke through. I was badly shaken. I was certainly not brave enough to spend another night in the house and moved my family into a hotel. I stayed there until the government found us a safer house in a secure compound. And, by the way, I can say that I was personally supported by Mekere Morauta, then secretary of the Department of Finance, later to become prime minister, when some penny-pinchers in the department balked at paying my hotel bills.