Uni Tavur is not a student rag which prints only student activists' news. Actually it is a tabloid newspaper - and a good one too that is printed, written and published by journalism students without fear or favour, catering for the students a large.
It is not filled with official UPNG propaganda but with stories that affect the daly lives of UPNG students and explaining government decisions that may affect their education.
Of course, it also deals in current affairs such as Bougainville, Sandline and the non-government organisation arrests.
Uni Tavur is an icon in university life. It is also an icon in Papua New Guinea and Pacific media life. Former editors and senior reporters read like a who's who of the media today. Even a judge and the Secretary of Commerce and Industry are among its graduates.
Onetime editorial staff can be found from the Vanuatu Trading Post to the Cook Islands News.
Anybody who has been in the neighbourhood of the Arts II Newsroom, the Michael Somare Library and the bookshop on publication Fridays would testify how popular it is. The papers go like hot kai kai.
Who has ever seen people queue up for The University This Week, the official university newsletter, as they do for Uni Tavur?
The paper, founded with New Zealand aid in 1974, has had many bouquets and brickbats - as any vibrant publication with a diverse range of news and opinions should have. But mostly we have had applause.
Two years ago - when this paper was relaunched as a tabloid - we won two awards: The first as the Best Student/Community Publication to mark the inaugural Pacific Islands News Association convention in Port Moresby; the second scored the coveted Journalism Education Association's Ossie Awards Best Regular Student Publication Prize - the first time that any of the Ossies had gone to Pacific Islanders.
The judge, chief executive Max Suich of Sydney's quality Independent Monthly, noted: "By far the most impressive was the University of PNG newspaper which had a level of maturity in its writing and editing and a concern with serious national issues that made it stand head and shoulders above the others."
Last year, we followed up with Uni Tavur Online, a cyberspace edition of the newspaper produced jointly with the University of Technology Sydney's Department of Social Communication and Journalism, which has proved popular with an international readership. And we also launched our website news service PNG Nius (with Pactok).
Just a few days ago we received a letter from a prominent Solomon Islands journalist complimenting the paper's "courage".
This word readily comes to mind when I think of our students, such as a former chief-of-staff and political reporter who were attacked and beaten up over a front-page lead story exposing an issue over national student politics. Or a reporter who was last year forced into becoming a fugitive over a story that exposed the scandal over Miss UPNG.
Threats have been common at times. And there was the night in 1995 when several senior women and men staff on the paper - and myself - were attacked at Waigani police barracks after seeing off our paper to press at the Post-Courier. The attack was in apparent retaliation over the land registration protests, an issue we had covered extensively.
All in the line of professional duty to bring the news and background information to our readers on campus and around the nation.
Sometimes the performance of our student editorial staff has been a delight. As the old media adage goes, they "afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted."
Since we began the "Uni Tavur Two Decades Ago" column earlier this year, it is remarkable how many headline stories then read like issues raised by Uni Tavur today - the harassment of female students, lack of maintenance, squandered resources, and, of course, politics.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
But now, without enough fulltime staff, Uni Tavur's days may be numbered.
As the Freedom Forum notes in a recent publication, Winds of Change: The Challenges Confronting Journalism Education: "The central skills of an excellent journalist - the ability to systematically gather, analyse and communicate information - are also central to higher education. They should be respected as such.
"But, too often, that has not been the case. Too many educators view the teaching of traditional journalism as a second-rate undertaking.
"Too many journalists view educators as out of touch with the profession. But if journalism education is to survive, it needs a close relationship between the practitioners and the teachers ...
"As budget-conscious university administrators look for ways to consolidate programs and save money, they too often look for a convenient way to lump everything from journalism to speech pathology under one roof.
"Let's not pretend that it is all journalism or that all resources devoted to things besides journalistic core values are helping to prepare future journalists."
Elsewhere university administrations have been grasping the essential Fourth Estate role of news media in a democracy and the public's right to know. They have helped shape tomorrow's journalists.
Critical and reflective journalists are essential for the development of the civil society in this country. UPNG, with its 170 journalism graduates produced across PNG and the South Pacific, has provided an important legacy.
Students, protesting in their recent petition over the state of the staffing in journalism and lack of broadcast facilities, said: "It makes us feel as if we are not part of the institution."
The challenge facing UPNG today is to demonstrate that the students are part of the university, recognise the long Uni Tavur tradition, and support the talents and contributions the journalism program has to offer.
And I for one, especially being the oldest journalist in Papua New Guinea, heartily support David's sentiments.
Perhaps if a certain Minister for Education had been a bit more thrifty with departmental cash, instead of spending departmental funds on hired motor vehicles, the UPNG school of journalism would more than exist with its funding instead of being beggars for a few crumbs from the government's table.
