Three interrelated problems characterise the situation in Tari: law and order breakdown, failure of service delivery, and rural stagnation. They have arisen over the past two decades from a complex of factors which are discussed below.
Inter-group warfare has increased both in scale and firepower over the past 15 years. Large-scale fighting re-erupted in the Tari basin in late 1986 after many years of relative peace. Since then battles involving many hundreds of warriors, some drawn from areas quite remote to the battleground, have become almost commonplace. In the mid 1990s firearms became widely used, increasing the number of fatalities and serious injuries in battles. The resulting, often inflated, compensation demands made conflicts harder to settle and fed into subsequent battles. In time, and in the absence of a suitable response by the authorities, recourse to arms reasserted itself as an acceptable way of dealing with disputes.
Criminal activity, especially roadblocks and robbery, has likewise increased in scale and violence, seriously affecting service delivery in many parts of Tari and Southern Highlands Province (SHP) generally. This activity is linked to tribal fighting, which creates an environment in which lawless activities can proliferate, entrenches a gun culture, and glorifies criminals who become ‘folk heroes’ in times of warfare.
The fighting itself has many causes. Most fights still arise from local matters. Population growth and an increasingly degraded environment in the less fertile areas (Yamauchi and Ohtsuka 2002) have exacerbated pressures on land and put people in closer proximity to each other, raising the number of everyday disputes and incidents. The increasing monetisation of the local economy is another contributory cause to crime and fighting. Roadblocks have become more common within Tari district in recent years, sometimes directly related to resource company payments. The Mt Kare gold rush in 1988 led to battles both at Mt Kare and in the Tari basin.
The corruption of the political process has also worsened the situation. The winner-takes-all nature of political contests has greatly raised the stakes in getting particular candidates elected. Over the years elections have become marked by a wide range of illegal practices, ranging from vote buying, rigging of electoral rolls, multiple and underage voting, to intimidation, violence and the hijacking of ballot boxes. Physical confrontation between supporters of rival candidates has resulted in death and destruction, the fighting in Tari town following the 2002 election being the most recent example. Political rivalry has also raised warfare to a new plane. In August 1999, a virtual ‘civil war’ broke out between Tari and Nipa districts following the death of a former provincial governor in a road accident. For a short period there was near-anarchy in Tari town, in which vehicles were hijacked and police-escorted convoys of men armed with shotguns circled the town before heading to the ‘front’ two hours east. Although the fighting was brought to a halt by the intervention of the provincial governor, Tari district remained largely isolated thereafter.
It should be emphasised here that warfare is usually a last resort, after mediation has failed. Many fights probably could be halted before they escalated if law enforcement authorities were active. Some battles have been defused by the intervention of police and district officers, but they are the exception rather than the rule. In general, attempts at suppression have been confined to punitive raids after the fighting has already caused destruction and loss of life.
Warfare must also be seen in its social context. For males at least, it is a participatory, inclusive activity. In a rural development vacuum, where men and youths have no organised, productive outlet for their energies, fighting brings an element of excitement in an environment in which there seems relatively little to lose. Few in Tari want to see a return to the era of endemic warfare, but few too have a realistic vision for a productive, peaceable alternative.
In the mid 1980s, most services in Tari were functioning. The road was open and passable and the town well supplied with consumer goods. The bank, post office and government offices were open. Power and communications worked most of the time, and were repaired when they broke down. Aid posts and health centres serviced remote areas, giving rise to excellent vaccination coverage of under five-year-old children. Schools were open and reasonably well looked after. But even at this relative highpoint, things were far from perfect. The public service was under-resourced and public servants did not, for the most part, venture far from town. Services in remote parts were less reliable than those nearer to the town.
The effects of public service shrinkage became obvious in the 1990s. Many different reasons have been advanced for this recession — under funding, mismanagement, corruption, politicisation, nepotism, lack of accountability, and lack of enforcement. Wherever the truth may lie, during the 1990s services began to be withdrawn from Tari town, and public servants retreated to provincial headquarters or simply failed to turn up at their offices. Morale among previously effective officers declined as their budgets were cut, despite a growing provincial budget. Equipment broke down, and was not repaired. Services declined further in remote areas. Aid posts were not staffed, teachers could not be found for classes. Roads and bridges were no longer maintained, and vehicles were misused or broke down. The public service largely ceased serving the rural population, and became instead a paid, town-based, elite serving mainly itself.
Not all of this was due to internal problems in the public service. Crime and fighting damaged public infrastructure and made travel unsafe for public servants. Communications facilities on remote mountain tops were subject to compensation demands and pillaged or destroyed. However the decline in the effectiveness of the administration, police and village courts contributed to the general demise by allowing these lawless activities to continue unchecked.
By 2000 Tari had been denuded of almost all its functioning services, and even those most valued and resilient, health and education, had been reduced to a bare minimum due to a lack of supplies and personnel.
Stagnation rather than decline characterises the plight of rural areas in Tari. Away from the town, little change has occurred in material standards of living for many people over the years (Vail 2002b). Most families still live in bush materials dwellings with no water supply or sanitation. Few people have a range of nutritious crops in their garden, and most rely on sweet potato for their subsistence. Although the amount of money in the local economy has grown many-fold, due to the arrival of the highway in 1980, remittances from people working outside the district, and payments received directly or indirectly from the large resource projects surrounding Tari, the main result has been increased consumption of purchased goods, the price of which has risen steeply due to inflation and supply restrictions.
A number of reasons may be advanced as to why there has been so little rural development in Tari:
Lack of productive economic activity. This in part arises from a lack of opportunity, due to unreliable prices for cash crops and distance to ports, but has been further undermined by crime, tribal fighting and the lack of maintenance of roads and public infrastructure.
Lack of a suitable rural policy. In part this is due to a bureaucratic mentality that maintains a deep division between the lifestyles of paid public servants and subsistence villagers. More generally, there has been a failure to formulate practical policies allowing rural people to participate in development.
An education system that is not geared to the majority who ‘drop out’ after six or ten years of school. Youths are educated in the expectation of paid work and ill-prepared for subsistence activities and community life.
False expectations by rural people, who were led to believe that their role was a passive one in which goods and services were delivered by public servants and wealth handed out by those in power.
The result of the neglect of rural communities by the authorities has been disaffection and discontent. Failed expectations and income inequality are an oft-stated justification for the take-up of crime by youth. Likewise, few well-educated people are willing or prepared to work for and in their communities while rural conditions are so poor. Essentially, a vicious circle has been set up linking law and order problems, service delivery failure, and rural stagnation. Is there a circuit breaker?