Our People in NSW
Neil Anstey - Wollongong
During his Wollongong childhood Neil Anstey grew up loving the beach, but now he’s seen enough sand to last him a lifetime.
Neil is currently based in the Sinai desert in northern Egypt, close to the border with Israel. He’s part of the 25-strong Australian contingent in the Multi-National Force and Observers (MFO), whose job it is to oversee the 1979 Egypt-Israeli peace treaty. Australians have been part of MFO since the very beginning.
Now a Warrant Officer, Neil has come along way from his musical days at Warrawong High School. He’s managing the administration needs of more than 1650 military personnel from countries as diverse as Canada, Uruguay, Colombia and Hungary.
“I was always going to join the military, ever since I was at Warrawong I knew I wanted to serve,” Neil said. “But I first started as a musician.”
“My family has always been involved in music, and the Army was the only service that offered a musician apprenticeship so it was the Army I joined.”
After time with the Army band in Sydney, culminating in a performance at the Sydney Opera House, Neil transferred to the Ordnance Corps to specialise in administration.
When Neil told his wife that he was being deployed, his wife asked if it was Afghanistan. When he said Egypt, she didn’t even realise the Army had people there. And she’s not alone.
“That’s one of the stigmas of this operation,” Neil said. “No-one knows anything about it!” One of my jobs here is updating the MFO website to try and increase the public’s knowledge of where we are and what we do.”
“But my main job is writing the routine orders and managing the travel allowances of both military and civilian personnel across the area of operations.”
Neil’s job doesn’t end with administration. He also investigates border incidents.
“If one of the observation posts reports a breach of the Treaty of Peace between Israel and Egypt, the duty investigator has to go out to the site, interview witnesses, gather evidence and verify if a breach actually occurred. Then our report is sent to MFO headquarters in Rome.”
Neil is just nine weeks into his six month deployment but says conditions for deployed personnel are better than ever.