Violence Against Women in Elections in Papua New Guinea

The International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) conducted its second Violence Against Women in Elections (VAWE) Papua New Guinea (PNG) Assessment in 2022 following the national general elections. IFES conducted the first VAWE assessment—the first of its kind in PNG—in 2018, following the 2017 elections (the report was published in 2019). This report assesses VAWE in PNG, drawing on fieldwork, research, and IFES’s experience operating in PNG. It presents recommendations for mitigating and preventing VAWE in the future. These recommendations are not substantially different from those included in the 2019 report. What does this tell us? Patriarchal social norms, gender inequality, gender-based violence (GBV), and patron-client politics continue to be pervasive, resulting in family and bloc voting, bribery, and intimidation that effectively disenfranchise women, people with disabilities, and the elderly. 

The Papua New Guinea Election Commission (PNGEC) has made progress in combatting VAWE by providing separate polling lines and polling booths at the majority (76.4 percent) of polling locations that Transparency International PNG (TIPNG) observed. This was a significant improvement over the 29.9 percent of such accommodations seen in 2017. Greater gender parity was also observed among electoral officials and security officers at polling and counting centers. 

The PNG government, writ large, only started to better resource GBV policies over the last two years, since the establishment of the Special Parliamentary Committee on GBV. The committee’s hearings and reports, published in 2021 and 2022, brought national attention to the government’s failure to act substantially on GBV since the passage of the Family Protection Act in 2013. The reports also drew attention to PNG’s reliance on donor-funded initiatives to support survivors of GBV. The government acted on some of the committee’s recommendations, including allocating funds to implement the PNG National GBV Strategy and criminalizing sorcery accusation-related violence (SARV is a form of violence that is generally perpetuated against women and girls who are accused of sorcery) in 2022. 

Ahead of the 2022 national elections, Prime Minister James Marape proposed amendments to the Firearms Act that were quickly passed on April 21, 2022, and signed into law on May 16₁  (just three days before the nomination period for candidates in the national elections closed), with the hope that new, tougher penalties would help curb electoral violence. Unfortunately, these tougher penalties were unsuccessful at deterring electoral violence. As in the 2017 election, PNGEC funding did not cover sufficient policing at polling and counting centers, making most electoral security reactive rather than proactive. In 2022, around 50 people were killed in election violence,  far fewer than the 204 deaths seen in 2017₃.  However, far more people were impacted in 2022 when election violence₂ triggered intercommunal violence on a large scale, displacing up to half the population in three Highland provinces. Internal displacement disproportionately impacted women and children; 70 women and girls were reported as raped, kidnapped, or victims of SARV during the 2022 elections alone₄.  

Law and order during elections is a serious issue that needs to be addressed. For example, in the Highlands region, candidates’ and their supporters’ stockpiling of illegal high-powered firearms in the lead-up to elections has become the norm. There are concerns that the violence experienced in areas not considered hot spots in the 2022 national elections may become normative as well. The PNGEC and the Inter-Departmental Election Committee will face challenges in addressing these issues. The work of the Special Parliamentary Committee on Electoral Reform offers an opportunity to reflect on pervasive election issues. 

[1] Firearms (Amendment) Act 2022, Papua New Guinea

[2] Kuku, Rebecca. The Guardian. 2022. PNG election violence: 90,000 displaced since May, 25,000 children unable to attend school. September 28, 2022.

[3] Chandler, Jo. The Guardian. 2018. Unprecedented violence and fraud ‘hijacked’ 2017 PNG election – report.  October 29, 2018.

[4] U.S. Department of State. 2022. 2022 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: Papua New Guinea. March 20, 2022.