The Yegiora Files

For the past couple of years, I have spent a lot of money buying Digicel mobile phone credits to purchase the various TV packages offered by Digicel Play . In a smart move, Digicel Play has secured the NRL broadcasting rights for PNG forcing all fans to pay in order to have access to their NRL channel TVWAN Action. Fans formerly enjoyed viewing for free when EMTV had the broadcasting rights. But the entry of Digicel into the market has changed the broadcasting landscape. They created Digicel Play and quickly capitalized on the fact that Papua New Guineans love watching the NRL. They also broadcast the PNG Hunters home and away games. Fans have to pay in order to have access to the TVWAN Plus channel. TVWAN Plus is different from TVWAN Action, sometimes fans are faced with a tough decision when a NRL game is televised on a Saturday afternoon time slot similar to a PNG Hunters match.  Furthermore, viewers have the option of watching the PNGNRLC games live on the TVW...

Many Papua New Guineans have blamed the Prime Minister Peter O'Neill for the 'no communique' issue. The notable Facebook post above is from the Member for Madang Bryan Kramer. He is one of the many. Like Kramer, the critics think the special treatment given to China was a contributing factor. O'Neill should have politely declined the Chinese President's request in July to meet with him and other Pacific leaders a few days before the APEC leaders summit. If he had done that then the US will not act the way they did. Kramer talked about O'Neill's divide and conquer tactic. He likened his domestic political maneuver to the way he courted China before the actual APEC summit. O'Neill used the state visit to make a profound statement that we will work with China to develop our country. Critics believe that this ignited a series of events that led to the 'no communique' issue. Furthermore, the alternative government in a formal state...

The last minute bid by Australia and its allies to offer an alternative package to help build PNG's National Broadband Network (NBN) is a vivid story of Australian ignorance. This could be detrimental to its bid to counter increasing Chinese influence in the region. This case further supports the view held by veteran journalist Sean Dorney. He said Australia never spent a great deal of money on Port Moresby when it was the headquarters of Australia's colonial administration. He compared Port Moresby with British built Suva to help measure the difference. Dorney elaborated that the Australian media ignores PNG. He gave a scenario in Canberra where many will have a lot to say about the Middle East compared to PNG in a cabinet meeting. Only a few Australians have any real knowledge of the country. Most of the news that is reported in the media is mainly negative and brief.  The Digicel cable television service and other private cable television companies include an ...

The video below from the New China TV channel on YouTube shows the new perspective of China that I have been talking about. China is using its public diplomacy tools well in the last few years to influence the minds and hearts of the foreign public.

In the past few months, I have read many commentaries on social media by Papua New Guineans about the China-PNG bilateral relations. The commentaries were from people with different levels of knowledge. Some of the commentaries were misleading and from people who knew less about both countries. There were some who gave insightful commentaries because they knew a lot. Regardless, it was good that many Papua New Guineans have started or are starting to talk about China in a different way. Prior to 2018, the talk was centered on the cheap or poor quality goods sold in Chinese shops. Many were also concerned about the national invasion of Chinese entrepreneurs. The anti-Chinese riots in different centers around the country was a materialization of the conversation.  The riots happened in May 2009. After that experience, I left for China to pursue postgraduate studies in September, the same year. While in China, I wrote an essay about China in PNG for my Korean professor. ...

This video is related to my article on Port Moresby as a metropolis.

Many people have complained on social media that the current government has focused on developing Port Moresby at the expense of other urban centers and rural areas. These complaints are true, we can see the tangible outcomes. Many have gone to the extreme of posting the pictures of a bad road or a sick child, next to the picture of the prime minister. Others have compared the pictures with the pictures of the new facilities built for the APEC meeting. Their central argument is the government should have spent the money on addressing our health issues or fixed our rural roads.  The principle of opportunity cost applies this is case. The O'Neill-Abel government is developing the city of Port Moresby at the expense of other urban and rural centers. This is because of the APEC Summit. The Australian and the Chinese government have both contributed a lot in order to transform Port Moresby into a metropolis . I have an optimistic view of the development of Port Moresby as ...

The quality of this music video is really good.

This change in international relations, where the BoP and elements of national power to do with military preparedness were rendered unfashionable in the 21 st Century, paved the way for the emergence of a new tool for analysis. Joseph Nye’s soft and hard power theory rose to prominence, especially soft power itself by far became the key catch phrase in this contemporary era of interdependence in globalization. [1]   Nye talked about how hard power resources like military capability and economic strengthen no longer posses the ‘carrot’ and ‘stick’ like authority to influence a state. [2] In essence, Nye was giving his analysis of how the world was changing and simply admitting the fact that hard power resources were becoming unfashionable because of the evolution of power as a concept. The rise of nationalism, cost of going to war, development of weapons of mass destruction, interdependence and international trade are demonstrations of changes that have occurred in time resulti...

In social science, the concept of power is used widely in different contexts. In social relationships, a parent has power over a child, in a remote village in the highlands of Papua New Guinea (PNG) a village chief has the ability to influence the actions of others in the village, and a police officer as a law enforcement agent uses the power vested on him by a nation’s constitution to exercise authority over individuals to ensure there is order in society.  Furthermore, there are numerous other applications of power in daily life, or in different branches of knowledge, but what is more important in this body of knowledge is the use of power to define the relationship and status of states in the international system, that is power is to international relations like honey is to bees, or like water is to plants. The concept of power is the bedrock on which the study of international relations is built on.  From this logic, the conventional behavioral definition of power u...