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Living in Two Worlds: The Story of Naomi Yupae and the Origin of Family Voice

By Naomi Yupae with assistance from Stephen Douglas

Violence against women in Papua New Guinea is highly integrated into the mores of the many cultural groups throughout this Melanesian island. This is a large country but one that, until the latter half of the 20th-century, has been isolated from western influence due to its imposing terrain. The problem of family violence is linked to the well-defined roles and responsibilities of women and men that have been passed on to successive generations through ceremonial activities such as initiations, mixed together with models of power and influence practiced in business and politics by early western colonial interventionists.

In a country where diverse cultures co-exist across mountains and languages - more than 800 "tok ples" are spoken in total in addition to the three national languages - the treatment of women and children also varies. For example, some coastal areas of Papua New Guinea are matrilineal societies and the status of women in terms of land ownership and decision-making responsibilities differs with that of women in the Highlands where tribal leadership is predominantly patrilineal. In some cultures the aggressive behaviour of men is encouraged and this is often directed in particular through violence against women and children.

This is not to say all customs are "bad" in regard to women, but rather that some well-intended customs are being abused at the expense of the women and children. For instance, the payment of brideprice has traditionally meant more than just "buying a bride". However, the payment of bride-price is viewed by some men as the purchase of a commodity, which usually leads to an abusive relationship in the marriage.

The purpose of this article is to highlight the growing awareness of the problem of family violence in Papua New Guinea, and the steps being taken by a group of individuals within the community of Goroka in the Eastern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea to address it. First, we begin by relating, in her own words, the story of Naomi Yupae, Coordinator of Eastern Highlands Family Voice.

Naomi's Story:
Breaking the Cycle of Abuse

I experienced growing up in the Highlands in the 60s and 70s at a time when I was torn between my own traditional roots and the colonial influence. This conflict was so profound I have not really been able to verbalize it (even on paper) until now. The idea of a girl going to school, for instance, was alien to my Bena Bena people and generally frowned upon. I was fortunate, however, to win a government scholarship and thus received the extraordinary experience of education in Australia at an independent girls' school, normally the reserve of Australians and well-to-do expatriates.

I received some uncommon support at home. Despite the expectations of our tribal line, my father and uncle had been exposed to western ideology through their work. Therefore, they were much more progressive in their thinking than their contemporaries and were not only supportive but also very much involved in the day-to-day educational activities for all their children.

My teachers were also determined to help me along the way. I was one of only four girls in my class of forty pupils. To make matters worse, I was the top student and as a result experienced verbal abuse from the male students. This treatment stopped immediately after a teacher challenged the perpetrators and expressed his intention to intervene with any other who contemplated interfering in any way with my studies.

In retrospect, I wish to thank these men for the stand they took. They went against conventional thought and practice to ensure girls such as I received an education. My father accepted a financial loss to send me to school, knowing that the value of my bride price would be greatly reduced because I was not going to be useful in rearing the pigs, working in the gardens and fulfilling my traditional responsibilities and obligations. With some irony, I note today that educated women receive a greater brideprice payment than the uneducated because they will be more likely to have paid employment and be able to provide financially for their new in-laws.

You may, upon reading this, experience the constriction and confusion I felt as I sought newly- imagined freedom and opportunity in changing times. My attempt is not to dissuade you from any criticism you might hold toward traditional values, much as I might like to suggest that there are those who might benefit from a less judgmental view of my culture and my country. Rather, this background may offer some perspective to the independent decisions I later had to make to break the cycle of abuse in my own life in Papua New Guinea.

I was removed from a typical traditional village lifestyle at the age of 11 years and placed in a culture that was at some other end of a time spectrum I could not yet comprehend. I wonder to this day whether it had all been just a dream for a village girl to travel alone to a big metropolitan city and be very much at home among 500 girls from all over Australia. This groomed me for a life of independence and offered me the ability to adapt to varied situations in life and to be tolerant of other cultures and values.

A surprising outcome arising from this experience was that I could not bring myself to communicate the Western (Australian) influence upon my life to my relatives because the contrast was too great to verbalize within the context of my village life. I mean, how do you explain to people about television and trains in a culture where people have just begun listening to the radio and literally believe that people are actually inside the transistor radio, talking! Such explanations suffice when it is just one individual on the air speaking but is considered to be "white man's magic" when it comes to the sounds of an entire choir singing. My life became increasingly lonely as I believed that few, if any, in my village could "speak" the same language as me even though I understood everything about them.

As a result, I began to keep my feelings and opinions to myself rather than make an effort to verbalize my experience. This contributed to the manner in which I learned to deal with other issues and problems, including the abuse within my marriage that occurred over a ten-year period. Finally, though, this coping style also enabled me to make a decision to break the cycle of abuse without even hinting of my intentions to my partner or, for that matter, to relatives.

The abuse I experienced included desertion and neglect for periods ranging from a month to even a year. My husband would then return to make life miserable for me and the children. First, he became financially dependent upon me, then began dishing out verbal, physical and psychological abuse to deal with his own feelings of guilt. The effect it was having on the children became a major concern for me since I had not witnessed nor experienced such abusive behavior in my own childhood and did not want it to be part of their lives.

The most important change that had taken place in my life, which gave me the personal strength to persevere under these most difficult circumstances, was one of spiritual faith. My personal interpretation of the acts and message of Christ, supported by my two pastors and the community missionaries, guided me to an understanding that abuse in marriage was not, as some might argue, "normal". Thus, I made up my mind to do something about what was going on - to bring an end to it. I knew this would be a difficult road to walk because of the expectations of my culture. Once brideprice is paid, marriage traditionally lasts for life, irrespective of circumstances. To make matters worse, children - in particular boys - were considered to belong to their father. The possibility of losing one, if not both, of my children was very real. I called upon my faith to provide me with the inner strength needed to proceed.

It has been ten years since the divorce came through. I made a conscious choice to remain a single parent and give the best I could to my two children. The days and months following my decision were difficult, but the pain has long disappeared and I feel as though I have been completely healed and restored. While they were emotionally impacted by the conflict they had witnessed earlier, my children are doing well today. Jeremy (19) is studying law at the University of Papua New Guinea while Alison (15) is still in high school, and scored at the top of her class in exams to complete primary school. I, too, have begun to thrive again. Following the divorce, I moved to Port Moresby to become the Training Coordinator for Probation Services, and later returned to the Highlands. Today, after four years, I have accepted an offer to be the first Coordinator for Eastern Highland Family Voice.

My children, my career, my personal well-being, and opportunities to return help to the community which once recognized the importance of lending help to me - for me these are all visible signs that even though life can be trying, we must endeavor to forgive the past and build a better future.

Status of Women and Children in Papua New Guinea Today

There are prolems in addressing family violence unique to Papua New Guinea, if not common to developing countries in general. First, the political and social systems in place are based upon introduced values and practices. In a country such as Papua New Guinea where culture dictates almost every activity of its citizens, efforts to integrate Western concepts in addressing issues concerning women and children can be rife with problems.

For example, by legislation, assault is a criminal act and should be addressed at the local and district courts but can also be dealt with at the village court. This is a hybrid model of law introduced with good intentions to maintain traditional conflict resolution practices within the British Common Law System. In practice, wife battering is deemed within the community to be a matter of "family" dispute and dealt with by the family or village courts. Village court magistrates are, in turn, appointed "big men" who rarely hear the argument of the wife (if she could muster the courage to raise it before a court administered by men). Rulings consistently go against the wives, unless they have compelling reasons, such as death or loss of limb, to judge otherwise. Thus, political and social recognition of the status of women is acknowledged but the willpower to "walk-the-talk" so that this recognition can become manifest, is lacking. Papua New Guinea women are still in the process of asserting themselves in all areas of life with little success as a group.

Yet amidst such odds, some individual women are making strides. In the 1970s, for instance, Josepha Kanawi was one of the few women enrolled at the University of PNG. She became the first woman to head the Law Reform Commission of Papua New Guinea, which reviews the country's laws to see how to simplify them and make them more effective in modern conditions, and today is the Chief Land Titles Commissioner, again the first woman to hold the position. She is a remarkable role model, demonstrating by example how women can responsibly handle positions of authority.

Marjorie Andrew is another to challenge to gender stereotypes in Papua New Guinea. Since leaving the University of PNG with a geography degree, she has worked in the area of government education and health social planning, and went on to completed a Master's degree in development studies at the University of Sussex in England. After seven years of work in the public service, she dedicated herself to parenting and chooses today to be at home with her two young daughters. She describes how support from family and community has helped to balance career and family goals in Papua New Guinea; "If you want to be a mother and be a senior manager, it can be done.but it takes a lot of organisation and help from others to serve your work and your family. Madiu [her husband] is very supportive morally and encourages me to further my career."1 

Within her community, Miriam Layton is a proponent of women and family rights. As Chairperson of both the Goroka YWCA and the Eastern Highlands Family Voice, she has worked tirelessly to bring to the forefront awareness of abuses to women and children that are committed under the excuse of "tradition". The government, through its inertia, tacitly permits these social inequities to continue. In the Highlands, for instance, it is evident that existing government services for women and children are poorly resourced and that legislation relating to the welfare of families is outdated and inappropriate. Services provided by churches and community-based organizations are quite effective, but often are isolated and struggle to provide a coordinated service to the people. Women like Miriam raise the profile of this work, helping us to speak with a collective voice.

Community Response Initiatives

Much has begun to appear in writing on the topic of addressing violence against women and children in Papua New Guinea, although the work has only been recognized for its importance since the early 1990s, when the Law Reform Commission on Domestic Violence completed its landmark study . Ten years in the making, this report cited widespread domestic violence affecting over two-thirds of families in the country, mainly in spousal assault with husbands using brideprice to justify their "right" to beat their wives.

The Commission recommended a five-fold approach to address this problem, including; 1) strengthening the application of the criminal law and improving the response by police, 2) improving the effectiveness of other means of legal protection through restraining orders and village courts, 3) maintaining public awareness campaigns, educational programs, and professional training, 4) improving counselling for victims, offenders, and both parties together, and 5) improving services for victims through improved health service response, availability of emergency accommodation, and legal aid. Each of these principles was clarified in more specific recommendations (54 in total).

Since the publication of this report, important work has begun in creating women's centres throughout the country and lobbying the government. Eastern Highlands Family Voice is an idea that originated in 1997 from a workshop facilitated by Individual and Community Rights Advocacy Forum (ICRAF) here in Goroka. Great interest was shown by the participants to implement programs locally in the Eastern Highlands Province to address issues affecting the rights of women, children, and families. This was like a seed being planted in fertile soil. Over the following three years, a Steering Committee chaired by Mrs. Miriam Layton was formed to work towards establishing the organisation. At the present time, Eastern Highlands Family Voice has just been incorporated as a Non-Governmental Organisation, to provide support to individuals and families seeking help from family violence. It has a clear mandate from the community it represents and is now poised and ready to open its doors. Naomi Yupae, coming full circle from her Bena Bena roots to the world of Western education and then back to the Highlands again, has agreed to be the first Coordinator of Family Voice.

A Canadian connection to Family Voice has been established with the arrival of Stephen Douglas, a CUSO volunteer consultant who has moved to Goroka for two years to offer assistance to Naomi and Family Voice. He has experience in agency and program coordination as well as in counselling families who have experienced domestic violence through the Children Who Witness Abuse (CWWA) Program. Together, Stephen and Naomi are forming partnerships with similar Canadian organizations. Both the BC/Yukon Society of Transition Houses (funding organization of the CWWA program) and the BC Institute Against Family Violence have agreed to a sistership with Family Voice in which ideas can be mutually exchanged.

It is hoped that this article offers the Canadian reader insight gained from Naomi's experience as a Papua New Guinean. Cross-cultural intervention is difficult at the best of times and the failure of legal systems imposed from an ethnocentric perspective, even when based in good intentions, remains evident. Clearly, any effort to assist women overcome culturally systemic oppression must come from the grass-roots upward. We must support these individuals who work to bring change from within their own culture rather than imposing an intervention appropriate to another world. This is a lesson we are slowly learning in Papua New Guinea.

Notes

 1 United Nations Population Fund. (1996). Successful women in their own right: Stories from Papua New Guinean role models, UNFPA Papua New Guinea Field Office, Port Moresby.  2 Law Reform Commission. (1992). Final report on domestic violence, Report No. 14, Papua New Guinea Law Reform Commission, Goroko.