Our Jeffrey Febi Stands for Elections

                                                                        

Candidate for the Lufa Open Electorate, 2012 Papua New Guinea National Elections

SOMETHING HEAVY HAD SETTLED on my head. I thought I felt my brain inflate and deflate rapidly. I didn’t know I wasn’t thinking. Then I heard a sweet voice cut through this wall of dense confusion.

“Mane!” I turned and saw my concerned mother. The wrinkles around her eyes have grown, her hair more grey. And, clutched firmly in her palm at the end of a frail extended arm, a kaukau. “You must eat,” her voice sounding the more alarming because of its concern.

The scene was more of a successful gathering than one of failure but I, with less than zero experience in crowd control and management, was more worried than every other person who approached to greet me.

After I nominated to officially become a candidate for the Lufa Open Electorate in the Eastern Highlands, I met the crowd. They didn’t come in hundreds; there were over a thousand people.

Men, women, boys, girls, children and babies; some had walked hundreds of miles, taking days to arrive at Lufa government station to witness this event.

Others have flown to Goroka then caught rides on PMVs (public motor vehicles) to Lufa. They are the people of remote rural Lufa; those who sing: ‘They call us camels; they call us white horses; they call us semi-trailers…’

The ensuing excitement and confusion (as I saw it) was over a thousand voices to listen to and innumerable hands to shake and many more bodies to hug. It was overwhelming.

PEOPLE OF LUFA, THE TIME OF POETRY HAS COME. IT IS TIME NOW TO RAISE THAT SONG OF CAMELS, THAT SONG OF COFFEE WHOSE AROMA IS KNOWN AND TASTED THE WORLD OVER!

THANKS TO JEFFREY FEBI OUR BODIES AND SOULS NOW AWAKEN TO THE NEW SOUNDS THAT DAWN BRINGS. AND EVEN IF IT MEANS TAKING THE PEN RIGHT UP TO THE DOORSTEPS OF THE NATIONAL PARLIAMENT, THAT WE SHALL! FOR THE BENEFIT OF OUR PEOPLE.

LET THE WRITER WIELD HIS PEN IN THE PARLIAMENT. LET THE LAWS OF THE LAND BE RE-VISITED, REVISED AND RE-WRITTEN, IF NECESSARY, FOR THE GOOD OF OUR FAMILY, OUR COMMUNITY, OUR PEOPLE AND OUR COUNTRY.

ASK FOR A WRITER’S CHOICE AND THE WRITER CHOOSES THE WRITER.

PEOPLE OF LUFA! THE WRITERS OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA GIVE YOU JEFFREY FEBI. VOTE HIM AND YOU ARE VOTING THE SOUL OF THE NATION INTO PARLIAMENT!

I thought there was no order, and something was brewing. Any moment from now it would burst and someone would be hurt. A child, a man, a woman, anyone…

Just to feed such a crowd was no easy task. A group of men and women in their mid-30s made it seem less arduous. They, young and untested, worked on and on.

There were peaks and troughs, some of which almost derailed their efforts. But at the day’s end, not a single hungry soul was to be found.

I, on the other hand, with less village experience and knowledge, couldn’t envision a successful ending.

This, coupled with the day’s heat and smell of the crowd, almost laid the foundations for a brain explosion.

As the election days unravel along with their latent challenges, I am hoping and praying I’ll be able to cope.

AND THERE YOU HEARD IT ALL. THE VOICE OF THE WRITER!

JEFFREY FEBI FOR LUFA OPEN 2012! 

Wording by Jeffrey Febi courtesy of PNG Attitude. Additional words of support by The Anuki Country Press.