[deccan]

Warning: Long post.
Warning: Serious discussion.

Whoa, I didn't mean this to be another "heated debate" on the Iraq situation. Anyway, here's a lowdown on the Solomon Islands (S.I.) since Loser asked.

Some disclaimers: I've only been in the country since early 2000, so I'm not a native. I also don't go out much (hey, I'm an SEIV-playing nerd after all, otherwise I wouldn't be posting on this board), and I've only left the capital city Honiara once to visit the provinces in all my years here (sad, huh?). I'm no historian too, so I may get some facts wrong. Also, I'm a senior executive of one of the largest logging companies operating, so my views and opinions will inevitably reflect that fact.

S.I., as its name implies, is composed of many islands. For the purpose of this discussion, we'll ignore the small ones and geographically isolated ones (Ontong Java, Rennell Islands, Makira Province etc.) The most important islands / provinces we need to consider are Guadalcanal Island (Central Province), the Malaitan islands (Malaita Province), and the various islands that make up Western Province (Vangunu Island, New Georgia etc.)

As some of the more historically inclined people may know, S.I., and more specifically Guadalcanal Island, was a very important theatre of operations during World War II (WWII). It is believed that the losses suffered here by the Japanese Navy at the hands of U.S. forces prevented Japanese reinforcements from arriving at Midway and turning the tide of the crucial battle there. WWII-related events continues to play an important role even in modern S.I. life, because every year, many war veterans, both Japanese and American, visit the country to grieve for their lost comrades.

The thing is before WWII, under the rule of the British (who set up their administrative capital at Honiara on Guadalcanal Province), the populations of the various islands more or less stayed put. However, for various reasons, when the Americans came, for some reason, they found it useful to import large numbers of Malaitan people into Guadalcanal Province to work for them. Even today, most people (me included) believe that Malaitans are more hardworking, sharper, but also more war-like and aggressive than the natives of Guadalcanal. The "Gualais" as they are known, are often thought of as being "dull", "slow" and "lazy".

When WWII ended, guess what, the Malaitan population stayed on Guadalcanal, and through the decades, completely dominated economic and political life in Honiara. They bought large tracts of land in and around Honiara from the Guadalcanal natives who subsequently felt that they were "cheated" and eventually the Malaitan population grew to such a point that Honiara became a sort of mini-Malaita.

At the end of the 1990s, the major export industries in the Solomon Islands were timber (conducted mainly by Asian, specifically, Malaysian companies) and tuna fishing (conducted by EU fishing boats, yeah, those boats sure range far don't they?, the Taiwanese and the Japanese). There was also a promising gold mining project run by an Australian company on Guadalcanal Island and funded using Asian Development Bank and World Bank money.

The thing is most of the logging and fishing were located in the resource-rich Western Province, whose natives are widely considered as shrewd as the Malaitans, though nowhere near as prone to violence. So the situation was that the export earnings of the Western Province were being funnelled to Honiara, heavily taxed by the Malaitan political elite in the capital and only meagre returns were being sent back.

This, combined, with the second-class status that many Gualais felt they were being relegated to on their own island, is naturally a recipe for disaster.

At around the end of the 1990s, large Groups of young, unemployed Gualais began harrassing and threatening Malaitan people who had bought land on Guadalcanal, asking for return of the land or monetary compensation. These Groups coalesced around a loose organization called the Guadalcanal Liberation Army (GLA, I kid you not), later renamed the Isatabu Freedom Movement (IFM). Eventually, these militias forced Malaitans to leave land located at the outskirts of Honiara. After a bit of this, Honiara felt like a city under siege, since no one dared to enter or leave the city by land.

In response to this, the Malaitans formed a group of their own, the Malaita Eagle Force (MEF). There wasn't really much violence at the beginning but mostly they lobbied the S.I. Government (and the Prime Minister of that time in particular, a Malaitan named Ulufalu) to compensate the displaced Malaitans. However, because the GLA/IFM's activities were mainly concentrated in the outskirts of Honiara, the expatriate population at Honiara were mostly annoyed / fearful of the bands of MEF people. Ulufalu continued to deny the Malaitans' request to compensate the displaced people using government money (good for him, I say!) Eventually rumors surfaced in Honiara that Ulufalu was secretly organizing yet another militia group of his own, code-named Seagull, to use against the MEF.

This was compounded by rumors and warnings by the GLA/IFM that people who didn't want to be hurt should leave Honiara because they would soon emerge from the jungle and "take" the city. They eventually did take over the Ross Mining facility, and helped themselves to the guns and explosives stored there. The Australians were all evacuated by helicopter. I could hear the chopper going around all day.

The MEF, angry at Ulufalu's inaction against the GLA/IFM and worried about being boxed in, decided the best defense was a good offense. In early 2000, they executed a well-planned coup d'etat, taking control of all police stations and armouries in Honiara and placing Ulufalu under house arrest.

Well, that was a pretty eventful day to say the least. I woke up expecting just a normal workday like everyone else, but it soon became clear that the whole city was eeriely quiet. There was zero traffic in the street and all telephone lines were down. Everyone was huddled in their homes and then Andrew Nori, a prominent Malaitan lawyer and politician, came on the radio, and announced that the MEF had taken effective control of the city overnight. They had also commandeered the offices and facilities of the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation and the Solomon Islands Telekom Company.

At around noon, MEF people, equipped with assault rifles and grenade launchers taken from the government armories began patrolling Honiara. They also started commandeering vehicles from people (we lost two cars and never recovered them). There was sporadic gunfire at the outskirts of the city when the GLA/IFM tried to find out what was happening (I live real close to the western edge of the city so I know). At this point however, the MEF vastly outgunned the GLA/IFM, so there was no real firefight.

Another complicating factor was that at this time, three Taiwanese warships were docked at Honiara, part of their annual visit here (the S.I. government recognizes Taipei instead of Beijing, and the Taiwanese give them money in return and try to give a good military showing every year). However, the Taiwanese refused to leave their ships (to be fair to them most of the guys on the ships were young men barely past their teens doing their obligatory military service) but stayed docked. After a while, the MEF and some prominent members of the Malaitan community wrote a letter warning the Taiwanese to stay out of S.I.'s domestic problems and the Taiwanese hauled anchor and left.

During this time, nobody left their houses and those who had satellite t.v. stayed glued to CNN (who were really exaggerating the situation here). The next day, we woke up to the sound of heavy automatic gunfire. The MEF had grabbed two police patrol boats and were strafing the coastline outside Honiara with machineguns. There was also some shooting at the international airport, which resulted in the cancellation of all international flights for the foreseeable future.

That day, we decided that it would be safer to hide out in the main, expensive hotel in the centre of the city (lots of expats there) than stay where we lived. That very night, while we were gone, our compound was broken into and raided. Heh.

But it wasn't until the Australian government decided to send warships to evacuate their citizens that we really started to panic (the Ozzies are leaving? They must know something we don't. Uh-oh.)

To be continued ...