Resisting exploitation in the Solomon Islands
An interview with Ian Aujare
by Cristina Verán

World's largest open-pit tin mine, Ariquemes, Rondonia, Brazil

From the British colonial occupation to World War II battles, the Solomon Islands have endured many waves of powerful, uninvited and exploitative guests. The most recent are Malaysian-owned logging corporations, which are behind the massive deforestation of the nation. These foreign firms stand accused of everything from desecrating sacred sites to soil erosion to the pollution of the sea and local water supply.

Solomon Islander Ian Aujare is an organizer for the Zazao Environmental Rights Organization which is working in Santa Isabel Province to address the grave environmental impact there of the globalized logging industry. He recently addressed the United Nations during the historic first session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

C.V.: How should Witness readers understand the context for the Solomon Islands, particularly Santa Isabel Province, which the Zazao Environmental Rights Organization represents?

I.A.: The Solomon Islands are very diverse, people-wise, culture-wise, linguistic-wise. I am only representing my own organization, which is made up of my own people from my own island of Santa Isabel. We share a lot with the other parts of the Solomon Islands, in what we are facing as a whole – the result of colonization and what people are now talking of as globalization. Colonization started from the north and moved southwards around the globe, so we in the Pacific were probably the last peoples to be colonized. In the Solomons, we received our independence as late as 1978, so I look at us as late-comers, the way these waves of problems reach us.

C.V.: How do average citizens of the Solomon Islands make a living?

I.A.: Only 15 percent of the population works for wages, while 85 percent live within a rural subsistence economy. They survive on their own, not because of the government or the companies, but because they grow their own food, they go fishing if they want to eat fish. They live in this way without really knowing of the various dangers coming from outside that are slowly creeping up and will threaten their lives and their way of survival.

C.V.: Why does the logging industry appear to have such a tight grip on things in your country?

I.A.: We are so small that we can be bought for breakfast, so we have been used to being pushed and pulled by bigger governments and multi-national companies. We began studying foreign logging companies operating on our lands and after a while we started to understand that all these companies coming in were really from the same company – just using different names. Operating in the Solomon Islands the company’s name is Earth Movers, though on Santa Isabel it is called Eastern Development Enterprises. We have been very confused by all of this, and we have to get our minds focused so we will be sure of the right way to proceed.

C.V.: The island nations of the Pacific region are distant and widely dispersed from one another – with which do you see the most similarities in this situation?

I.A.: Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, New Caledonia – the whole Melanesian sector of the Pacific region – have many logging companies and mining companies coming in. I don’t really know much about the situation with the Polynesians and the Micronesians. We may share some commonalities in regards to dealing with multinational companies, but on a different wavelength.

C.V.: Unlike countries such as the U.S. or Australia, where indigenous representation within the national government remains sparse, your own government is itself comprised of indigenous Solomon Islanders. To what extent has it been in tune with and responsive to the concerns of the people?

I.A.: There is a lot of understanding between the government and the people, but even though we are 99 percent indigenous and have a government that is also 99 percent indigenous-represented, the system itself is not indigenous. That is where the main conflict exists. I tend to believe that we no longer even have our own systems.

C.V.: Do you think the United Nations and the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues can really address indigenous concerns?

I.A.: The Permanent Forum is the only higher body within the U.N. that has taken on board the issues of indigenous peoples. Its role, as I see it, is to provide advice to U.N. agencies and governments to the ECOSOC level – which is high – compared to the Working Groups on Indigenous Populations and the Working Group on the Draft Declaration – which are so low. So far as I know, the U.N. Draft Declaration has only adopted two articles in seven years.

I have been following the process since 1998, and part of it for three years, attending the meetings in Geneva including the Working Groups on Indigenous Populations and on the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

I tend to find these meetings so painful. We go there, year after year and give the same statements, talk about the same issues. We may be using different words, but it’s all the same things, really.

I see all of these [other] indigenous peoples from all over the world coming there as "victims," as witnesses presenting their cases, their testimonies, while governments are pretending not to see, not to understand.

C.V.: The potential benefits of bringing together such diverse peoples seems very clear. And yet, too, there are real obstacles to organizations like your own even attending these summits.

I.A.: Indeed. The Zazao Environmental Rights Organization is not "funded" and so, since we got organized, we have worked only according to our own resources. If we could buy airline tickets using coconuts and things that we have, more of us might be able to come to the meetings. But even if we could get here that way, we couldn’t pay our hotel bill in New York City with coconuts.

C.V.: How does island culture and the local church influence the populace in its dealings with foreign corporations doing business in the Solomons?

I.A.: We have five main churches here: the Anglican Church, and then we have Catholic, Seventh-Day Adventist, South Seas Evangelical Church, Wesleyan United, and now also many, many smaller churches coming up as well. The way they operate here is, more or less, just taking care of the spiritual needs and religious life of the people. None of them have I seen to stand up to actually talk about the issues like the environment or sustainable development. They never do.

To learn more For more information, history, and statistics on logging in the Solomon Islands, throughout the Pacific Region, and beyond, visit the following: Forests Monitor www.forestsmonitor.org Forest Stewardship Council www.fscoax.org World Wildlife Fund — Pacific Regional Office www.wwfpacific.org.fj/forests.htm Greenpeace www.greenpeace.org

We are so Christian here, and because of Christianity, we are so vulnerable. If you walk into a village in the Solomon Islands, you will be well received. It doesn’t matter if you’re a good person or a bad person. If we were to ever say "no" or "get out" to a company man or a government man, then it’s a sin. The Bible doesn’t allow that, and we have to respect what the Bible says –otherwise, we won’t go to heaven.

But the way I look at it, if we are Christians, then we are supposed to take care of the Lord’s creation – not destroy it. If we destroy it, then that has to be a sin itself. If you look in the Bible, the Bible never says "go off and destroy the forest." If you destroy it today, then it is also destroyed for the future generations as well.

C.V.: While the Japanese, who once occupied the Solomon Islands during World War II, now arrive with blueprints for industrial and tourism development, what level of interest have those other prior "guests", the U.S. and the U.K., shown in not only Santa Isabel but the entire Solomons group?

I.A.: It makes me sad that sometimes, when I introduce myself as coming from the Solomon Islands, people from England or the U.S. ask, "Where is that?" We know where to find the U.S. and England on the globe. Yet people from the countries who make the books, who make us read the books, still don’t know who and where we are.