Foreign affairs awaits reports from Brisbane

By JEFFREY ELAPA

 

THE Department of Foreign Affairs is yet to receive a full report on the status of PNG citizens living in Brisbane, Australia, The National reports

Acting secretary Alexis Maino told The National that his office was still waiting for reports to be compiled by the consular-general in Brisbane.

Maino said he had not received updates of how many citizens were affected and what plans were in place to assist them.

Meanwhile, according to unconfirmed reports, many PNG citizens, mostly children of politicians, business people, judges and chief executives and secretaries, were living and studying in Brisbane but it was not known if they were affected.

Several attempts to contact the consul in Brisbane were unsuccessful.

According to an email report, four youngsters from Papua New Guinea managed to get away from the Queensland flood earlier last week.

The three boys and a girl, who were attending a national Christian youth convention on the Gold Coast, and were sent to stay with the Uniting church in the rural Queensland town of Maryborough, were saved by the minister.

The email stated, at the time, no one knew that the town would be swept up in the damaging floods while the youths were enjoying themselves.

Another lucky PNG family to have been saved thanked the national flag carrier, Air Niugini, for holding the flight out of Brisbane for them to be evacuated.

The email read: “On behalf of my family, I would like to thank Air Niugini for delaying the aircraft for seven minutes on Jan 13 at the Brisbane airport so my family could board flight QF379 for Port Moresby.

“We were in a rush to get out of Brisbane due to the recent floods.”

The email said since all major roads were closed, they got on an early train bound for the airport but, again, the train stalled midway.

A quick-thinking Queensland railway staff put them on a taxi to the airport 10 minutes after checking closed, but the plane waited and got the family out of Brisbane.