A COLUMN WRITTEN BY KALIOPATE TAVOLA, PUBLISHED IN ISLANDS BUSINESS, JUN 2023

The Forum for India-Pacific Islands Cooperation (FIPIC) held its third Summit last May in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea (PNG), after a postponement. That country’s ‘Post Courier’ highlighted the meeting by publishing: “PIF Secretariat Rues being left Out’. This was a reference to Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat (PIFS), Henry Puna, writing to PNG’s Prime Minister James Marape, co-host of the Summit, on behalf of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) for leaving out PIFS and other PIF members from the Summit. Only 14 Pacific Islands Countries (PICs) were invited to FIPIC.

Prima facie, such an omission would constitute an abrogation of established order – similar to that I highlighted in my IB article published in October 2022: ‘Declaration on U.S.-Pacific Partnership Abrogates Established Order’.  That October 2022 article highlighted that the Declaration was for the US, on one hand, and 16 PICs on the other hand. As it happened, only 14 PICs did sign the Declaration. Kiribati and Niue did not sign due to their absence; the reasons for which were considered legitimate by Washington. Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) were not invited.

Those who may think similarly that it was an abrogation would certainly be justified in doing so. However, in that October 2022 article, I had also flown a kite in that such an abrogation might represent a silver lining – “by giving precedence to a PICs-only forum whose fullest expression may have finally come”.

In retrospect, events over the years have somewhat substantiated such a ‘silver lining’. FIPIC’s Port Moresby Summit, for example, was its third. Its first-ever Summit was held in 2014. Only unforeseen annual hitches have prevented such Summits from taking place annually.

The Republic of Korea, after 27 years of being a PIF’s Dialogue Partner since 1995 and after 11 years since it started its series of Foreign Affairs ministerial meetings, will host its first ROK-Pacific Islands Summit this year.

The annual Japan’s Pacific Islands Leaders Meetings (PALM) started in 1997 with only PICs Leaders. The meetings have now included ANZ PIF Leaders.

 There may be other external development partners who may be considering conducting their own cooperation summits directly with PICs.

It should be noted that PICs have not only talked about this idea but have acted on it. At the UN level, Pacific Small Island Developing States (PSIDS) is a recognized grouping that is doing great work as part of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS).

In 2015, as part of a consultancy, I wrote a report: ‘Reconfiguration of Pacific Regional Architecture’, where I amplified the idea of a PICs-only forum that is structurally linked to ANZ to form the architecture of Pacific regionalism (the Forum). The proposed architecture also provides structural formats whereby other external development partners may participate in any cooperation arrangement with the Forum members on a collective basis.

Later, I presented the idea at a University of the South Pacific (USP) workshop. The idea then developed and was published under the chapter: ‘Towards a New Regional Diplomacy Architecture’ in ‘The New Pacific Diplomacy’, 2015, edited by Greg Fry and Sandra Tarte.

With climate change as the region’s existential threat, and given the disunity in climate change policies, particularly with PIF member Australia, PICs have had to consider an only-PICs forum to promote climate change globally on a more effective basis. Former Prime Minister Sopoaga of Tuvalu had thus suggested the idea of an ‘United States of the Pacific’.

This idea was not rejected when discussed by PIF Leaders (PIFL) meeting in 2019. PIFL “welcomed the offer by the Prime Minister of Tuvalu to commence dialogue with Leaders on a new 2050 vision for Pacific Island Countries that recognized the Blue Pacific Continent that make up the territories and economic exclusive zones of the region and how Pacific Island countries can form an effective union, building on the SAMOA Pathway and the Boe Declaration, to ensure a safe and secure future for the Pacific in the face of climate change.”

This PIFL’s 2019 resolution, interestingly, reflected the configuration of the South Pacific Forum (SPF) when it started in 1971. That first meeting was in two caucuses. – the five PICs comprising one caucus and ANZ the other caucus. Each caucus met separately at first and then they came together for a joint meeting. In the next SPF meeting in 1972, the Leaders agreed to do away with this divided meeting approach. Australia orchestrated such a reconfiguration.

The concept of a PICs-only forum that came to the fore in 1971 had a thought-provoking earlier genesis. It was borne out of a rebellion – the Lae Rebellion in 1965. The five PICs, only one of which was independent at the time, but were all invited to participate in meetings of the then South Pacific Commission (SPC) established in 1948 under the Canberra Agreement. The metropolitan powers comprising the SPC, banned the PICs from raising any political issues in their meetings.

The PICs thus rebelled. But it took them six years to form their own forum, to which they then invited NZ to join. Australia asked subsequently to also join. They all had their first meeting in Wellington, NZ, on 5-7 August 1971 under the banner of the South Pacific Forum (SPF).

It can be seen therefore that an all-PICs forum was instrumental in the creation of the SPF. This grew into the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) in 2000 ‘in line with its decision at Palau in 1999 to change its name’ as a result of its expanding PICs membership.

The idea of ‘silver lining’ projected in this article, continues to appeal to regional pundits. Fiji’s all-PICs forum: Pacific Islands Development Forum (PIDF), that has membership beyond states to include Civil Society Organizations and the private sector, is undergoing review. The idea of strengthening PIDF’s role in climate change and geopolitics – two critical issues for PICs, is being strongly promoted. The idea of PIDF evolving into a think tank for these two issues is being critically assessed. With strategic design, such a think tank could morph into policy analyses and formulation and the creation of a library space where PICs leaders et al could think and write their memoirs. Furthermore, the idea of the Pacific Elders Voice (PEV) having a space within the PIDF, where it continues to play its independent role, is also being thrown in for consideration.

Any silver lining is a metaphor for optimism. What is considered negative – the preferred creation of cooperation structures with PICs only instead of all the PIF membership, can and do have justification and benefits. The future beckons. PIF’s history, in an effective supporting role, is further testimony to such optimism.

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