Instability in Pacific politics? Yes, but it’s stable instability

Political instability in the Pacific isn’t significantly increasing. It just feels like it—with the recent dissolution of parliament in Vanuatu and motions of no confidence in Papua New Guinea, Tonga and Solomon Islands.

Although the past two years show a spike in leadership challenges, these are due to specific countries—Vanuatu in 2023 and PNG in 2024—and not widespread circumstances. A review of the political history of selected Pacific island countries since 2010 shows no distinct upward trend in the frequency of attempts to change government. Moreover, the reasons for the attempts have not changed significantly.

In other words, Pacific instability is more or less stable.

Pacific island governments are taking steps to try to reduce instability, but those measures are likely to take time to have much impact.

Since 2010, there have been at least 49 attempts to change or remove the prime minister in four Pacific island countries: Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Tonga. Those countries aren’t the only ones in the region that have faced such challenges, but their high frequency of political turnover makes them most useful for analysis.

 

 

While no-confidence motions submitted by opposition members are most common, in each of these countries leadership challenges or changes can take place in other ways. Resignations can pre-empt votes for removal—as just happened in Tonga—and in Tonga and Vanuatu the king or president, respectively, can decide to dissolve the legislative assembly under the certain conditions.

More often than not, such attempts fail to achieve a change of leadership: only 11 attempts successfully toppled the prime minister or triggered a dissolution that ultimately resulted in a new leader in the 14 years for which we assembled data. Regardless, the motion itself often triggers a shake-up in ministerial roles to guarantee numbers and shore up coalitions. While that has less impact than a change in leadership, it can still impair the government’s effectiveness.

For example, in Vanuatu, which had the highest recorded number of leadership challenges, many motions were withdrawn once the opposition realised it didn’t have the numbers. But the motions continued to occupy sitting time or triggered a distracting extraordinary session of parliament.

In PNG, the government has previously adjourned parliament to avoid a no-confidence vote. In 2021, the hiatus lasted four months, meaning the government didn’t meet as often as it could have during the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2016 then prime minister Peter O’Neill adjourned parliament to avoid such a vote amid student protests against government corruption.

Even when things appear calm, leaders spend a lot of time and effort in keeping parliamentarians happy. Between 2016 and 2020, then Vanuatu prime minister Charlot Salwai survived a total of six no-confidence motions to become the first Vanuatu prime minister to last a full four-year term in more than 20 years. He was eventually charged with perjury at the end of his term for misinforming the public and the courts about his decision to appoint additional parliamentary secretaries to maintain stability. In 2021 Salwai received a suspended jail sentence of more than two years, which forced him out of his seat. Later that year, he received a presidential pardon, allowing him to again stand for public office.

In Solomon Islands, attempts to remove the prime minister have been less frequent than in some other Pacific nations, but no-confidence motions against provincial premiers occur more often. They aren’t limited to Malaita, where an ongoing battle over the diplomatic recognition of Taiwan versus Beijing has contributed to recent political instability, but also occur in other provinces.

It’s not unusual for foreign partnerships to feature in leadership challenges, but, in this dataset, partnerships with China, Taiwan, the US or Australia were mentioned only occasionally. Currently, it’s more common for geopolitics to be part of the conversation in Vanuatu and Solomon Islands.

In Vanuatu last year, those attempting to remove then prime minister Ishmael Kalsakau questioned whether deeper security engagements with the West that the government was considering would undermine Vanuatu’s proud non-aligned position.

In 2011, Solomon Islands prime minister Danny Philip resigned after his coalition disbanded, citing concerns over corrupt use of Taiwanese discretionary funding. Deepening relationships with China were a factor in political instability and riots in Honiara in 2006 and 2021, and Chinese businesses were targeted in the 2006 Nuku’alofa riots.

Historically, undesired closeness to foreign powers has been cited on occasion and has probably been a smaller or non-public factor in other attempts at changes of government. Most challenges come down to domestic power jostles and concerns over government mismanagement and corruption.

Many Pacific countries have sought to introduce legislation to reduce political instability within their systems, but the effect of such changes varies or is still emerging.

In 2010, Tonga introduced time constraints on votes of no confidence. Such motions may not be within 18 months after or six months before an election, nor 12 months after the last such motion. And yet, it has still seen at least one such motion per term.

In PNG, in addition to grace periods of 18 months after an election and 12 months before one, no-confidence motions require the approval of the Private Business Committee of parliament, which decides whether a motion should proceed to a parliamentary vote. However, motions rebuffed by the committee are repeatedly resubmitted, as in 2015 and 2016, when four motions against Peter O’Neill were moved before the final one failed. The PNG government had also attempted to extend the grace period to 30 months, as well as to triple the notice period for motions to 21 days in 2012 and 2013, but the Supreme Court overruled those constitutional amendments in 2015.

Vanuatu has also pursued greater political stability. It held its first referendum since independence with the aim of reducing political instability by forcing independents to affiliate with a party and ruling that members would have their seat vacated if they were expelled from their party. Unfortunately, the resulting laws were not gazetted by the government before the dissolution occurred. Even if they had been, it would have taken time for such changes to have any effect.

In looking at all this, Australia shouldn’t be one to judge. Since 2010, Australian prime ministers have faced eight leadership challenges, four of which were successful. Those challenges also led to process changes at the party level, which at the very least have reduced challenges to the prime minister in recent years. In time, we may see the Pacific’s changes having a similar effect.