Former BRA general Sam Kauona Sirivi cautiously welcomed the new “Agreed Principles on Referendum” for Bougainville agreed to between the PNG Government and the Bougainville Negotiating Team.<\/p>\n
The agreement was reached on Friday, January 26, 2001 in the town of Kokopo, East New Britain, PNG.<\/p>\n
What was hailed as a “major break through” by the leaders was the compromise to hold a referendum on independence within a minimum of 10 years and maximum of 15 years from the date of the election of a Bougainville government. The agreed principles are, however, conditional on “weapons disposal” (disarmament) by the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) and “good governance.”<\/p>\n
Commenting from New Zealand, the former commander said: “It\u2019s an unfair agreement, and a vote on independence in a referendum should not be made conditional on BRA weapons disposal, only.”<\/p>\n
“The Lincoln Agreement, provision 4, which I was a signatory to, also clearly emphasizes the “Withdrawal of Defense Force from Bougainville,” in a “phased withdrawal,” subject to the restoration of civil authority.<\/p>\n
“Why wasn\u2019t this provision also included with disarmament of the Bougainville Revolutionary Army?<\/p>\n
“As Far as I am concerned all forces, PNGDF, BRA and Resistance, must be all subject to the same provision of demobilization, as according to the Lincoln Agreement.<\/p>\n
“I cannot believe that our leaders have given so much away and therefore are selling Bougainville away.<\/p>\n
“You have given too much away to the dishonest government,” said the former Commander.<\/p>\n
Knowing past false promises made by the Papua New Guinea Government, the former Commander was wary about PNG\u2019s inability to honor agreements.<\/p>\n
“We are essentially asking an institution, the PNG Parliament, Bougainville\u2019s the No.1 enemy, to give Bougainvilleans their freedom. It\u2019s like a pig tied to a pole. We are already negotiation on an unequal platform,” said Mr. Sirivi.”<\/p>\n
“The survival of the PNG\/Bougainville peace process depends very much on honesty, fairness, and transparency. The Bougainville struggle was voiced and fought for more vigorously (than anything) since pre-colonial and pre-PNG independence days. If we have not learnt from our past mistakes then, this struggle could go on for another forty years,” concluded Mr. Sirivi.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Former BRA general Sam Kauona Sirivi cautiously welcomed the new “Agreed Principles on Referendum” for Bougainville agreed to between the PNG Government and the Bougainville Negotiating Team.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55897\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}