Sean Dorney

He lived to the age of 84 – an extraordinary innings in a country where the average life expectancy is 20 years short of that at 64. But he achieved so much he could have been 104.

In the general history of Papua New Guinea that I authored – last updated in the year 2000 and covering PNG’s first quarter-century of independence – Somare is mentioned on no fewer than 62 pages. It simply reflects his dominance of the political scene in those years.

'The Embarrassed Colonialist' is a Lowy Institute Paper, published by Penguin Australia and written by Sean Dorney, who has been a leading figure in Pacific regional journalism for decades.

Mr Dorney said in many ways Australia seems to have forgotten that for a long time, PNG was its colony.

Since the book's recent publication, he heard an interesting aside from a member of the PNG Australia Association.