Place:Enga, Papua New Guinea

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source: Family History Library Catalog

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Enga is one of the provinces in Papua New Guinea (PNG). It is located in the north most region of the highlands of PNG, having been divided from the Western Highlands to become a separate province when the provinces were created at the time of independence in 1975. The people of Enga are called Engans—they are a majority ethnic group—speaking one language in all its five districts: approximately 500,000 people. A small minority of Engans' land on the eastern side of the region remained in the Western Highlands, their territory being accessible by road from Mount Hagen but not directly from elsewhere in Enga territory.

History

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Although little archaeological excavation has been done in Enga, it is clear that the area has been settled for over 12,000 years. Europeans—typically Australian gold prospectors—originally entered what is now Enga province from the east in the late 1920s, although the best-known exploration of Enga took place during the early 1930s when Mick Leahy and a party of men travelled from what later became Mount Hagen to the site of the future Wabag and then south through the Ambum Valley to what later became East Sepik.

By World War II Enga had been very roughly mapped by the government, but a permanent government presence was not established in most of the district until the late 1950s. Lutheran missionaries from the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod in the United States, as well as Roman Catholic missionaries, were permitted to establish stations beginning in 1949. Both established primary schools and the Lutherans a high school. Although the Gutnius Lutheran Church that developed from the Lutheran efforts has strong links to the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod, it has become associated with the more mainstream Evangelical Lutheran Church of Papua New Guinea, sharing clerical training at a college in Lae, Morobe Province.

Enga was part of Western Highlands District until just before Papua New Guinea independence in 1975, when most of the Enga-speaking part of the District (with the notable exclusion of the region which is inaccessible by road other than from Mount Hagen) was separated into a discrete District. Eminent international poet and writer E. A. Markham worked and lived in Wabag as a VSO volunteer in 1983-84 and wrote A Papua New Guinea Sojourn about the province and his time in it.

As in some other provinces the provincial government has a history of corruption and lack of capacity, and is unique in Papua New Guinea for having had its power suspended three times by the national government due to concerns over its accountability. Ultimately in June 1995 in an effort to re-assert a measure of control by the central government over the often wayward provinces in an environment of limited numbers of personnel qualified for public office in many of the provinces, the office of provincial premier was abolished and the Regional (at-large) members of Parliament became provincial governors, while retaining their national seats in Parliament.

Nationally eminent Engans have included the late Malipu Balakau, Sir Tei Abal, Sam Abal, Don Polye, Sir Pato Kakaraya and many others.

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