2 November 2022
Ms Gloria Hong in the Solomon Islands raised an important issue in a brief note posted on Linkedin today about the RSIPF's policy on current training and the emphasis on firearms and public order disturbances
Becuse of the limited allowances on words as a reply set by Linkedin for such posts, I set out below my extended response to Ms Hong's comments.
"Gloria, if you have been able to see and read my many letters and opinion pieces on the use of arms by the police you will have come to know my stong views on the arming of the local polce service - and views which are very much in line with your commentary today.
Community policing must be the core policy of the RSIPF as it was intended it to be when I first introduced the policing policy iniiative in 1997. It was in those early days supplemented by the work of those under the control of the late Fr. john Rowan, as his son, Paul, can relate about the SIDT.
DCP j Matangs recently said budget support for community policing was limiting the police expansion of community driven police development, but very sadly this seems to have led to less community policing approaches and, in retun, we have seen the presence of external police forces giving traning in public order policing - and using both real and imitation lethal firearms in the training approach.
The RSIPF still has the traditional equipment that in my days and before was used in riot conrol, shields, batons and tear gas, albeit for reasons in several of my many letters I said why I did not order the use of tear gas because of the manner in which it angered protestors and led to added intolerence of police actions and could only have provoked more trouble.
Firearms supplied to the police prior to my arrival in the SI as the police commisioner in 1997 were issued to the paramilitary arm of the police force, the NRSF and essentially they worked as an army within the ranks of a civilian police organisation and did not sit comfortably with my concepts of community policing and the minimum use of armed force.
The national crisis we these days refer to as the 'Tensions' after my departure 1999 happened essentially because the Australians failed to heed all my intelligence warnings or offer any help (which they could easily have rendered without a full scale battle sized incursion under the guise of a RAMSI operations and was not requested so much my the PM at the time, but one imposed on the SI by John Howard's administration but only after the deaths of 80 or so Austalians in Bali.
The Australians took the view that the SI could have developed into a haven for terroritst activity close to its shores and this was largely prompted by the view shared at the time by the US. So, in effect Australia became, if you like, the deputy sherriff of the US In in the Pacific Region. I am sure RAMSI was not something Alexander Downer approved of at the time because as the Aussie Foreign Minister he was totally opposed to sending Australian combat troops together with their miltary assests to help the SI put an end to the militancy that arose in the SI through the urging of then politicans opposed to the SIAC government that was eleted to office in the general election of 1997 - and led by a PM who came from Malaita. The attempts to throw out the PM by means of several parliamentary votes of no confidence all failed and so the tactics turned to urging the likes of Keke and Sanga to begin and inensify an armed and bloody conflict, following much on the style of militancy witnessed in Boungainville.
The Malaita Eagle force resulted from the actions of the GRA and the so called Isatambu Freedom Fighters.
The lethal firearms supplied by the Australians and in general use by the NRSF were stolen during a raid on the Police Central Amoury and used by them in confronting the Keke and Sangu led militants.
All of what began as the rise to miltancy, forced evacuations of Malaitan plantation workers and the split that occurred in the ranks of the police forcce, the deaths of civilians, the failure of the government, the toppling of the then PM at gun point and the failure of the Australian government to act on the early and reliable intelligence I shared with them.
I told all this in full in my book 'Policing a 'Clash of Cultures,' on Amazon.
Once I left the police force in mid-1990 one read repeatedly of the unlawful use of force by the police, at Gold Ridge, and the completely - never to be forgotten - use of a police patrol boat used in an operation off the Weathercoast when a machine gun on that vessel was used to fire on civilians ashore, causing deaths and injury. A shameful and wicked act by the police at the time.
Now one reads the Australians are going to be supplying, next year, a type of M4 carbine in use by the US military - a lethal firearm in the wrong hands by the members of the RSIPF to be deployed on public order duties during a time of public disturbance such as rioting.
All know of what happened last November in Honiara when the police deployed to public order duties allegedly fired tear gas at a public gathering that started out peacdefully at the Paliament building and a gathering of people that constitutionally had a right to raise concerns. Without a community policing approach to negotiatiton with the crowd assembled at the time, my guess is the ensuing riots, arson, theft of property and the virtual destruction of Chintown could have been prevented; not forgetting two civilians lost their lives during the rioting and the government saw ecomnic damage of millions of SI dollars.
Now in Honiara, in addition to the remaining presence of Australian police and military personnel there are PRC Police training the RSIPF on public order duties and using replica, imitation firearms, so far. How the PRC police were able to circumvent the provisions in the SI Law dealing with a ban on imitation firearms, as imposed by the Firearms and Ammunition Act, beats me to understand.
Janita Matanga when she talked of not having the available funding in the police budget to further expand community policing as a core policy of the police, she said she needed to ensure the police had the right kind of mindset to deal with police-public relations, and I totally agree with her,
Just let us imagine a situation when there is a fresh outbreak of public disorder and policement not having the right mindset but armed with the proposed M4 lethal (and not a replica or artificial one use it). The consequencies would be a disaster for the country, the police service, the ruling politicians and could bring about the deaths of many civilians.
The wounds of the so called dark days have not yet healed after 25 years and will fester again with the use of yet more firerarms and ammunition. Turn back to community policing and see the RSIPF is given the budget funds to expand its core policy. Firearms are not the answer to police public relations in the SI and all use of force - whether by use of the old traditional methods of riot control, or by the issue of firearms must be guided by the principles of the minimum use of force at all times."
Frank Short.
