Tired of Primitive Life

My mother was born in the 1920s, a time when there was no electricity or kerosene and oil lamps.

While growing up in my village in the 1970s, my mother would narrate to me and my siblings about life in the 1920s, and what it was like with no electricity or kerosene and oil lamps. She would reminisce about how hard life was without electricity or light.

She and her family had to cook and eat during the day because there was no light at night. A fire was lit in the house and kept throughout the night to provide a little light, and the smoke produced was mainly to chase off mosquitoes.

At night, it was not possible to venture outside to relieve oneself because there was no light. All one had to do was hope that nature's call would not come calling at night or one had to put everything on pause mode and wait for daylight. Without light, the risk of stepping on poisonous snakes, encountering tribal enemies and sorcerers, or bumping into wild animals such as pigs were high, and most people preferred not to venture outside at night.

The story my mother narrated was about  primitive life, and all I could do was let my mind run deep into the past and imagine how hard life was for my mother and her family. It was a life I could not imagine myself or my siblings ever living it had we grown up in the 1920s. I simply did not think mt siblings and I would have survived without electricity or light had we grown up in the 1920s.

In the 1940s and 1950s, electricity and kerosene and oil lamps arrived, making life easier for my mother and her family. They could cook at night and venture outside to relieve themselves at night using kerosene or oil lamps. 

The reason I am telling this story is to point out the harsh realities of chronic power shortages and continuous and prolonged power blackouts in towns and cities throughout Papua New Guinea.

Everytime there is a lengthy blackout in Port Moresby, I am reminded of the harsh realities my mother and her family had to endure in the 1920s. The realities of primitive life haunts me as I sit in the dark in my rented accommodation or find my way outside to breath fresh air.

As a kid, I dreaded the idea of living without electricity or light whenever my mother told of her experiences in the 1920s.

Today, however, I have come to realise that with prolonged blackouts in Port Moresby, I am reliving the life my mother and her family experienced in the 1920s without electricity or lights. Having torches and phones to provide some relieve in terms of alternative lights in the house does not totally help, and I can still hear my mother reciting her experiences over and over about how hard life was without electricity and light.

The Americans sent a rocket to the moon in 1963, way before I was born, and sent a robot to Mars and safely returned to earth some years ago. That was the space age, and we are now in the digital age, with electricity now being produced from more sources than rivers and creeks.

Today, electricity is produced using rivers and creeks, sea waves and tides, solar energy, geothermal energy, biogas, wind energy, and thermal energy from  incineration of municipal waste. The options for generating electricity and light today far exceeds that of the 1950s and 1960s, but why is Papua New Guinea still plagued with chronic power shortages? 

Chronic power shortage and continuous and prolonged blackouts in cities and towns throughout the country are doing nothing more than bringing us back to primitive life. These power legacy issues are just annoying and a nuisance to the public, but the PNG Government and PNG Power Limited seem to have no answers to the problem. 

It has taken ages for successive governments to look into the chronic power shortage problem in this country, and I think it is time they throw in the towel and sell off PNG Power Limited.

In addition to selling off PNG Power Limited, we need to review the legislation on power production, distribution, marketing, and regulation. Maybe it is now time to open up for privatization of power production, distribution and marketing. Regulation can still be overseen by the government.

Papua New Guineans are already fed up with power shortages and continuous and prolonged blackouts. These things are bringing us back to primitive life, and we are already tired of it.

Enough is enough, and we cannot go on pretending that we are ok with power.

We just celebrated 50 years of Independence, but we still lack one of the necessities of life - energy for light and electricity. Therefore, we are politically independent, but we are not independent in terms of energy for light and electrity.