Cecil Charles Geoffrey Abel was born on 1 February 1903 at Kwato mission, in what is now the Milne Bay Province of PNG, on the eastern tip of New Guinea.
[1][3] As a result of Japan's entry into World War II with its attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, the majority of non-Papuans were evacuated to Australia.
They provided equipment and organized labour to assist the Australian army to develop Milne Bay as a base, and supplied wood from the Kwato mission sawmill.
On 14 August 1951, Abel married Semi Bwagagaia, a schoolteacher from Logea Island and granddaughter of the traditional owner of Kwato.
At the same time, reduced support from overseas donors still recovering from the war, compounded by apparent financial irregularities during Abel's period as treasurer, threatened the future of the Kwato Extension Association, the body that had managed the mission's assets since being established by his father in 1917.
Together with a number of his students, including Michael Somare and Albert Maori Kiki, he became involved in an informal group known as the Bully Beef Club.
Abel was elected to the House of Assembly of Papua and New Guinea as a Pangu Party member for Milne Bay (Regional) in 1968.
Later that year he drafted the party's economic policy, which emphasised the need to increase overseas capital investment; raise exports in both primary and secondary sectors; reduce imports and encourage import replacement; greatly increase secondary industry; and move from a subsistence to a cash economy.