The bishop of Bougainville, Bernard Unabali, says the church will support whatever the outcome would be - independence or autonomy.

He said this when preaching at Our Lady of Assumption Cathedral at Hahela in Buka last Sunday.

"We'll not tell you to vote for independence or vote for autonomy.

"We'll only support whatever the outcome is - independence or autonomy," he told the congregation.

He said he would not let the church become involved in politics, and wanted to see a clear line of demarcation between it and the government.

"The church should keep a fair distance from politics and only engage in the spiritual aspects."

Unabali said a peaceful post-referendum transition period was crucial.

Some of the spiritual events to take place before the referendum are reconciliation by clans at the village level.

A region-wide prayer vigil, would be held on the 14th of June, 2019 - just a day before the vote takes place.

The referendum on independence from Papua New Guinea next year will be conducted under the terms of the Bougainville Peace Agreement.

The Bougainville Department of Peace Agreement Implementation is touring PNG's main centres to make people aware of the upcoming vote and their right to have their say.

The department head, former Bougainville president James Tanis, said they wanted to encourage people to participate and to ensure they were enrolled in time.

"The Peace Agreement already says that they need to participate in the referendum, but what we are working on is a process through which we can confirm their eligibility.

"There are a lot of Bougainvilleans outside Bougainville. We are trying to establish contact with them."

Source

• radionz.co.nz
• looppng.com
• radionz.co.nz
• radionz.co.nz
• Image: catholicukes.org.au

He said this during his speech at Teituno village in the Wisai area of Buin in south Bougainville while witnessing a reconciliation ceremony in May.

The reconciliation saw the families of late Raphael Duake and Lucy Rukume who are brother and sister coming together once again after a ten year conflict that kept them disunited.

The conflict that affected the livelihood of the two families and the people of Wisai arose from differences and misunderstandings between the two families.

This led to killings that saw both families losing their loved ones.

The reconciliation ceremony began with a para-liturgy led by Unabali followed by a buai chewing and tree planting ceremonies.

In his speech, Bishop Unabali challenged the people of Bougainville to be true witnesses of peace.

Almost every family in the islands of Bougainville, an autonomous region of about 300,000 people in the Pacific Island state of Papua New Guinea, has a story to tell of death and suffering during the decade long civil war (1989-1998), known as ‘the Crisis'.

Yet fifteen years after the 2001 peace agreement, there is no accurate information about the scale of atrocities which occurred to inform ongoing peace and reconciliation efforts being supported by the government and international donors.

Now members of civil society and grassroots communities are concerned that lack of truth-telling and transitional justice is hindering durable reconciliation.

"I believe there should be a truth telling program here and I think the timing is right," Helen Hakena, Director of the Leitana Nehan Women's Development Agency, a local non-government organisation, told Inter Press Service.

"It is nearly twenty years [since the conflict] and some people have moved on with their lives, while there are others who have just cut off all sense of belonging because they are still hurting."

Unabali, concurs. "Truth is absolutely necessary, there is no doubt it is an absolutely necessary thing for peace and justice," he declared.

Source

• wantokniuspepa.com
• ipsnews.net
• Image: screenshot: youtube.com