Who Should Supersede Grand Chief Somare?

Francis Hualupmomi, in China
With Prime Minister (PM) Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare officially being declared medically unfit in maintaining and continuing National Alliance-Coalition(NA) leadership until next election, the question one might ask is who will supersede his leadership? I provide a prediction premised on observation.
It is quite difficult to predict Sir Michael’s successor given the complexity of NA’s coalition make-up, however, from observation we can only construct some most-likely scenarios.
The current NA-Coalition government under Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare over the years has had several leadership competitions among coalition political parties based on regional politics.
From evidence gathered, leadership tussle is between Highlands’ regional camp and Momase Camp, whilst Southern and the Nuigini Islands regional camps seem moderate and bandwagoning.
From this constellation, we can assume a common pattern that Highlands and Momase camps will compete for leadership. We expect three political factions within Highlands regional bloc, the O’Neil’s group, and a split in Enga between current acting PM, Sam Abel’s group, and former deputy PM leader and highlands hot candidate Don Polye’s group. The other highlands political leaders may most likely bandwagon these three groupings depending on their most given preferences.
Given highland’s complex political culture, we expect that a split in Engan groupings would most likely shift alliance to Southern Highlands group. In Southern Highlands, the most likely hottest candidate will be Peter O’Neil. However, that does not dispute a change in Engan politics. Should Engan MPs unite we expect a different scenario. Don Polye would be most likely to assume leadership than Abal.
On the other side of the coin, the Momase camp may also face the similar political competition. We expect a split between Patrick Pruaitch and Arthur Somare. Although both leaders are highly competitive, Arthur may assume leadership for three major reasons. First, Arthur will be most likely preferred over Pruaitch to maintain Grand Chief’s Legacy. Second, Arthur has played an important role in political economic development by bringing ashore many high impact projects such as LNG and public enterprise reforms while serving several ministerial portfolios. Final, Arthur’s leadership may attract NA support in honor and recognition of Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare.
In the middle camp, we have Nuigini Islands and Southern camps, both of which do not possess potential candidates for the leadership. In Nuigini Islands camp, we expect Paul Tiensten to command bandwagoning with Momase camp. In Southern camp, there is a vacuum for possible PM contender after the defection of former deputy Prime Minister, Sir Puka Temu, to Opposition.
Given this political situation, we expect two possible scenarios. First, both camps may remain faithful with Momase camp in fear of loosing leadership to highlands region. Second, there will be a split within the camps between Pro-Somare and pro-Pruaitch factions. Although there is possibility of defections of MPs in coastal regional bloc to highlands regional bloc this may less likely to occur.
From the situational analysis, we can draw some conclusions. First, a possible political instability within NA-Coalition is inevitable. Second, we expect some unexpected leadership shift in highlands regional camp with new faces should there be a stalemate in leadership between Enga and Southern Highlands. Third, we expect split in Momase regional camp, however, it is most likely that Arthur may possibly assume leadership. Fourth, we also expect a split between Nuigini Islands and Southern regional Camps; however, it is most likely that both will support Momase camp.
This leaves us with four most likely possible candidates: Arthur; Abal; Polye; and O’Neil. In projecting a rough prediction, we expect Arthur Somare to reign should there is stalemate between highlands regional MPs. However, should highlands regional MPs unite, we expect Don Polye to assume leadership.