Band entertainment after the game
Cook Islands celebrate with a song and dance
Part of the grandstand crowd at the Lloyd Robson Oval
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Friday, October 23, 2009
Pacific Cup kicks off in Port Moresby this weekend
The 2009 SP Brewery Pacific Cup, the newest rugby league competition on the international calendar, is scheduled to be held in at the Lloyd Robson Oval in
The competing teams are Cook Islands,
The four Pacific Cup matches will be played at Lloyd Robson Oval on October 24-25 October and October 31 October.
The Pacific Cup final will be played on November 1.
The winner of the 2009 Pacific Cup will compete in the 2010 Four Nations tournament.
Momentum continues to build around the newest event on the international rugby league calendar, with SP Brewery’s announcement of sponsorship a strong show of corporate support from the host nation.
SP Brewery has been a driving force in developing rugby league in PNG, highlighted by a 21-year commitment as naming rights sponsor for the country’s premier competition.
The SP Brewery Pacific Cup is set to attract unprecedented radio and television audiences for a Pacific Nations Rugby League tournament with coverage into the
Thursday, October 22, 2009
World Bank has conflict of interest on Bougainville
By James Wanjik, Former Secretary for Mining
BOUGAINVILLE is fortunate to have mining powers unlike other provinces in
However, having mining powers is one thing.
Having the capacity to exercise that power is another.
Since 2001 when Peace Agreement was executed,
Only consequential actions were required.
Thus the National Parliament approved the constitutional amendment in about 2003.
Subsequently the Autonomous Bougainville Constitution of 2004 was approved.
From 2004 the ABG was in a position to promulgate mining policy and pass law.
However, in 2005 the National Government through Parliament passed the Mineral Resources Authority Act 2005.
It has nine sections and 15 issues dealing with Panguna mine.
This is contrary to the Constitution of PNG.
It is likened to giving with right hand and taking it all back with left hand.
MRA is that left hand.
The MRA in turn confused the National Government and the ABG.
This confusion resulted in the National Government and the ABG signing a 15- step Alotau Pact on 31 March 2008.
It was a political pact.
It politicised ABG’s mining powers.
The confusion is the MRA.
It is on
The combined readings of sections 288 and 290 of the Constitution of PNG vests mining powers in the ABG as the legitimate government on
The ABG would have been overrun by the MRA had it not been for kind hearts of PNG.
Now MRA is politicising PNG Government.
It has not approved World Bank Loan yet we hear.
The World Bank was responsible for creating MRA.
Graeme Hancock was the World Bank consultant who drove World Bank agenda in PNG.
Now Graeme Hancock is with the World Bank.
Graeme Hancock also advised former Minister for Mining Sam Akoitai on MRA.
He was at the verge of being engaged on Letter of Engagement to be a consultant adviser to the government on a K 6 million package.
MRA, World Bank and Graeme Hancock have huge conflict of interest.
ABG would be advised to beware. K20 million it is promising is a loan.
ABG will be nailed with loan conditions like it nailed PNG under its previous loan.
With Graeme Hancock at the World Bank, ABG will need strong leadership to get assistance.
Graeme Hancock knows how to manipulate laws, leaders and public servants to have his way.
Under the previous loan Graeme Hancock was exempted from paying any tax on consultancy fees. He failed to submit a project closure report.
He left five days prior to end of his consultancy contract to avoid embarrassment and political powerlessness.
Till Graeme Hancock is out of PNG, MRA will be a proxy for World Bank.
Graeme Hancock and MRA are World Bank moles in PNG.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Papua New Guinea ranked 56th in the latest press freedom rankings
By Reporters Sans Frontières in Sri Lanka Guardian
(October 20, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian): Political power grabs dealt press freedom a great disservice again this year.
A military coup caused Fiji (152nd) to fall 73 places. Soldiers moved into Fijian news rooms for several weeks and censored articles before they were published, while foreign journalists were deported.
In Thailand, the endless clashes between “yellow shirts” and “red shirts” had a very negative impact on the press’s ability to work. As a result, the kingdom is now 130th. Two Asian countries were included in the index for the first time: Papua New Guinea (56th), which obtained a very respectable ranking for a developing country, and the Sultanate of Brunei (155th), which came in the bottom third because of the absence of an independent press.
The authoritarianism of existing governments, for example in Sri Lanka (162nd) and Malaysia (131st), prevented journalists from properly covering sensitive subjects such as corruption or human rights abuses.
The Sri Lankan government had a journalist sentenced to 20 years in prison and forced dozens of others to flee the country.
In Malaysia, the interior ministry imposed censorship or self-censorship by threatening media with the withdrawal of their licence or threatening journalists with a spell in prison.
War and terrorism wrought havoc and exposed journalists to great danger.
Afghanistan (149th) is sapped not only by Taliban violence and death threats, but also by unjustified arrests by the security forces.
Despite having dynamic news media, Pakistan (159th) is crippled by murders of journalists and the aggressiveness of both the Taliban and sectors of the military.
It shared (with Somalia) the world record for journalists killed during the period under review.
The Asian countries that least respected press freedom were, predictably, North Korea, one of the “infernal trio” at the bottom of the rankings, Burma, which still suffers from prior censorship and imprisonment, and Laos, an unchanging dictatorship where no privately-owned media are permitted.
The media in China (168th) are evolving rapidly along with the rest of the country but it continues to have a very poor ranking because of the frequency of imprisonment, especially in Tibet, Internet censorship and the nepotism of the central and provincial authorities.
Similarly in Vietnam (166th), the ruling Communist Party targets journalists, bloggers and press freedom activists over what they write about its concessions to China.
In the good news section, Maldives (51st) climbed 53 places thanks to a successful democratic transition while Bhutan (70th) rose another four places thanks to further efforts in favour of media diversity.
Asia’s few democracies are well placed in the rankings. New Zealand (13th), Australia (16th) and Japan (17th) are all in the top 20.
Respect for press freedom and the lack of targeted violence against journalists enable these three countries to be regional leaders. South Korea (69th) and Taiwan (59th) fell far this year.
South Korea plummeted 22 places because of the arrests of several journalists and bloggers and the conservative government’s attempts to control critical media.
The new ruling party in Taiwan tried to interfere in state and privately-owned media while violence by certain activists further undermined press freedom.
Opposition withdraws motion of no-confidence
Opposition Leader Sir Mekere Morauta announced today that he and Bulolo MP Sam Basil had written to the Speaker withdrawing the motion of no-confidence in the Prime Minister dated July 28, 2009.
Sir Mekere said: “We have withdrawn the motion because we do not have confidence in the integrity of the process being used by the Government to ‘consider’ the motion.
“We have heard from reliable sources in government that the private business committee will reject the motion, allegedly on some technical ground.”
Sir Mekere said that to avoid this, the motion had been withdrawn and that the Opposition had requested the Speaker to provide urgent advice on the alleged ‘defects’ of the motion.
“We want the Speaker to tell us what we should do to satisfy the private business committee, so that we can submit a new motion that will conform to the committee’s ‘requirements’,” he said.
“At the same time we shall seek legal advice on the issue of the process of tabling a motion of no-confidence in the Prime Minister.
Sir Mekere said that since last week he had been seeking an appointment with the Speaker and the Clerk to verify the information about the Government’s intention to prevent the motion from being tabled, but had not been successful in getting an appointment.
“We do not want to fall into the game of dirty tricks being played by the Government to block the motion, so we decided to withdraw it and put the Government on the spot by asking the Speaker to advise us,” he said.
“The Speaker and the Clerk must remember they are not the servants of the Government.
“They serve the Parliament, which means they are obliged, legally and morally, to advise the Opposition.”
I see a rainbow in the sky
I caught this wonderful rainbow in Port Moresby last Sunday when returning to work after watching the rugby league grand final.
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