Marilyn Havini AM after concluding her role as AVI Mentor

Marilyn Havini AM

I was virtually dragooned into forming the Hako Women’s Collective (HWC) in 2004. It occurred this way … on holidays in Bougainville for a Christmas break from teaching visual arts at Cheltenham Girls High School, Sydney, Australia, I was hoping for a quiet family time of reconnecting after a 17-year absence during the Bougainville Conflict. I remained in contact with women leaders throughout the negotiations for peace between Bougainville and Papua New Guinea. With Josephine Tankunani Sirivi, we co-wrote and edited … as MOTHERS of the LAND—the birth of the Bougainville Women for Peace and Freedom (BWPF) published by Pandanus Books, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies ISBN 1-74076-043-3 in 2004.

Hanpan Bamboo band and chiefly women welcome HWC guests at opening and closing ceremonies. Here, the band performs outside the Resource Centre following the establishment of the Bougainville Partnership Cocoa Project

I carried the royalties for the book back to BWPF, but Haku women were upset that I would leave them to travel to Arawa during my time with them in Buka, an island north of mainland Bougainville. I explained the BWPF to them—as an umbrella women’s group formed during peace negotiations to represent women at the Burnham and Lincoln Peace talks held in New Zealand in 1997-98. The Haku women increasingly swelled their numbers to form a collective from across Haku and insisted they also become part of the BWPF.

Twenty years later, this company of women celebrates its 20th anniversary of what has developed into a community service organisation…the Hako Women’s Collective (HWC).

Operating night and day from premises granted on a 25-year renewable lease in our village of Ngalkobul, Ward 4, Haku Constituency, the HWC provides services to all 12 Haku government wards. Our training and nation-building participation extends through government and non-government partnerships with other areas of Bougainville. We have become a hub for many families, clans, communities, churches and schools. Membership is open to individuals and to groups to access our training centre, library and literacy programs, food security, economic and environmental projects, the Meri Seif Haus and Men’s Hub services and referrals.

Built on voluntary participation, our organisation’s strength began with women’s fellowships from across all the church denominations in Haku. This was the only existing means of gathering as women following the Bougainville conflict. In prayerful unity, the women started from nothing. They walked for many kilometres at agreed times to various villages. They identified community needs and went to work. Some notable memories of building peace and sustaining peace in Haku are:

• 2005 Women’s Forum—650 women attended and participated in 12 workshops from the 1995 International Beijing ‘Platform for Action’, analysing issues to present to the chiefs, the newly sworn-in Autonomous Bougainville Government’s (ABG) President Kabui and Chief Secretary Peter Tsiamalili and MHR for Haku, the Hon. Januarius Tenevi.
• Youth programs—the following year we held a youth forum, leadership training, sports and creative arts and performing arts workshops funded by the ABG for 330 youth. Over the next four years, we established the Haku Sports Federation, conducting annual sports carnivals until each sporting code could operate independently and participate nationally and internationally.
• In 2007, HWC members scrubbed out the Lemanmanu Health Centre, cleaning the grounds and donating equipment and services. Our petition for an ambulance for Haku succeeded eventually—just in time for the 2011 cholera outbreak. HWC women were trained by WHO and the Department of Health to do the drudgery of emptying slop buckets and advocate for hygiene protocols to successfully counter and eradicate Cholera in Haku.
• Positive parenting—bringing UNICEF’s End Violence Against Children (EVAC worldwide campaign) throughout the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, developing a homegrown Positive Parenting program, Stret Pasin long Lukautim Pikinini. These programs are ongoing since their inception in 2017.
• Court Users Forum held in 2010 for 100 chiefs and hundreds of Haku Grade 6-8 school students. This was conducted by the PNG Law and Justice Department and the PNG Attorney General’s office.
• GBV/SARV 2023-2024 interventions to negotiate peaceful conflict resolution to several serious cases of long-standing gender-based violence (GBV) and sorcery accusation-related violence (SARV).

Typical afternoon reading time with children in the HWC library—(Photos provided by Marilyn Havini AM)

Hako Women’s Collective was incorporated, with its initial growth made possible by several Australian International Volunteers (AVI). I served in three consecutive roles in program mentoring and implementation of organisation management under the auspices of AVI. Our chief operational partnerships continue in training and networking with ABG departments and the well-recognised Nazareth Centre for Rehabilitation. We have worked closely with various United Nations programs and non-governmental organisations and the Digicel Foundation, which funded the construction of the Meri Seif Haus.

Haku is at the end of Buka Island’s trunk road, with no town or commercial centre. Access and funding to build, to operate services and implement community programs have always been the chief determinator of what HWC can deliver. In a post-war situation, the ABG has been cash-strapped and unable to fund the organisation, but we have gratefully accepted small contributions from local members over the years. Support from international bodies with overseas partnerships, grants and volunteers working alongside our members in building, training and serving has proved a mainstay. Most of these organisations are from Australia, such as Indigo Foundation, PiCCA (Partners in Community Collaborative Aid), The Bougainville Partnership, C3 Churches of Ryde and Cherrybrook, Hillsong, Baptist, Catholic churches, and the UK-based Old Darts Foundation (ODF).

Our current programs address post-conflict trauma and family and sexual violence with a safe house for women and children and a separate men’s hub for rehabilitation. The Law and Justice referral pathway embraces HWC’s work with residential and outpatient clients for rescue and care, counselling, dialogue, and assisting family resolution through village and district courts.

Our volunteers, in partnership with the ABG’s Department of Primary Industries and Marine Resources and volunteer organisations, work to tackle food security, especially in densely populated villages. Programs address backyard farming and soil composting, rice cultivation, cocoa farming, forestry regeneration, reef, mangrove, crabs and local fishing resources. The HWC’s newest partnership is with the Kyeema Foundation to assist farmers in developing Ples Kakaruk (local chicken farming and coral farming).

Hako Women’s Collective continues to develop, expand and respond to needs. Its future will be guided by HWC’s vision statement:

Lu hatolo mi u hiromomo kao hovotori Hako Collective

In the spirit of love and true sisterhood, we, the women of Hako Collective, are called to build a safe, secure and just environment within our families and communities and create an integrated sustainable development that will establish a better future for our children and children’s children.

We have much to celebrate for 20 years of sustained development. The HWC’s resource centre now consists of an office and library, a separate training hall with kitchen and storage facilities, an agriculture hub with a rice mill, a program and a project office, a traditional conference catering hauskuk, the safe house and men’s hub, an agriculture shed, a cocoa fermentary, a budwood garden, a garage constructed in readiness for HWC’s 20th anniversary arrival of a 15-seater bus from the ODF. This bus will provide rescue for clients, access to referral pathway services, a mobile library for children in 13 schools of Haku, and operation mobilisation for volunteer programs.

Celebrations were held on 26 June 2024, the actual anniversary date from date of origin. The HWC theme: 20 Years Creative Arts for Peace Celebration. Thank you to all past pioneers, present volunteers and partners for your enormous contribution. We hope that we can continue to serve Haku with love and support the everyday operations with encouragement and wisdom for our children and their children’s children for the next twenty years. 

Note: Hako & Haku are both pronounced as Harkoo

You can learn more about HWC by visiting http://www.hakowomen.org