THE Australian government is looking at Manus as a possible site for a regional refugee processing facility, The National reports.
This comes after the government encountered strong opposition to a centre being located in Timor-Leste.
But the Australian government is yet to formally raise the use of the Lombrum centre on Manus with PNG leaders.
Foreign minister Stephen Smith has briefed his PNG counterpart Sam Abal on Julia Gillard’s proposal for a regional approach to asylum-seekers during their meeting in Alotau, MilneBay, last week.
Australian home affairs minister Brendan O’Connor said they would engage with any of the countries within the region on this matter that were signatories to the (UN) refugee convention.
He said this when asked whether ManusIsland, used for refugee detention by the previous Howard government, could be a possible alternative site.
“Papua New Guinea is a signatory to the refugee convention and, therefore, we are willing to engage on that basis, because we believe we need to have a regional approach, one that also recognised the convention in that manner.”
Earlier yesterday, the department of foreign affairs and trade released the transcript of a press conference held in PNG last Thursday between Smith and Abal.
Smith explained that he had briefed his PNG counterpart on Gillard’s proposals but had not sought any indications about particular locations for a refugee processing centre.
Abal said PNG had “the place up in Manus” but had yet to consider reopening it.
A spokeswoman for Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare said yesterday there was no approach on the matter, and “any consideration would have to go before the cabinet”.
PNG has been housing about 10,000 refugees from fighting across the border in Indonesia for about 20 years in a manner recently commended and applauded by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
Manus Governor Michael Sapau had expressed his willingness to have the centre reopened because of the resulting jobs and income for the province.
THE Highlands Highway is to be expanded to a four-lane freeway, Works, Transport and Civil Aviation Minister Don Polye said last Friday, The National reports.
“It will be expanded in stages starting from the Lae-Nadzab section where survey, scoping and design work had commenced.
“Rehabilitation work will continue to Hela’s Koroba-Kopiago and Enga’s Porgera,” Polye said.
He said the government had spent between K700 million and K1 billion on rehabilitating the highway in the past five years.
“Given the highway’s economic significance, the government has given it top priority,” he said.
Polye said on-going maintenance on the highway was being undertaken by different companies funded by different donor agencies in collaboration with the government.
According to a presentation by National Road Authority Planning and Programming Unit manager John Kelly Kaio, there will be progressive rehabilitation conducted on different sections of the highway through the six provinces.
The details of the rehabilitation are:
* Morobe section from Lae city to Yung Creek (Morobe and EHP border) 163km maintained by Transport Sector Support Programme (TSSP);
* Eastern Highlands from Yung Creek to Magiro (EHP and Chimbu border) – 177km maintained by TSSP, Simbu government, national government funding through departments of Works, National Planning and Treasury and Finance under the Highlands Highway rehabilitation programme (HHRP);
* Western Highlands from Miunde (Chimbu and WHP border) to Togoba junction – 83km maintained by NRA, contracted to Works Department;
* Togoba junction to NebilyerBridge – 19km to be maintained NRA through Works Department;
* NebilyerBridge to WHP and SHP border – national government contract under HHRP suspended;
* Kisenapoi to AngulaBridge ongoing HHRP contract;
* AngulaBridge to Mendi – no financier;
* Mendi (SHP border) Margarima (Enga border) – financed under ADB to be upgraded under ADB-multi-financing facility (MFF);
* Enga’s Magarima (Enga border) to Kandep – maintained under ADB;
* National government regravelling project to be upgraded under ADB MFF;
* Kandep to Laiagam – regravelling and upgrading under ADB MFF;
* Laiagam to Wabag – 40km maintained under ADB; and
* Wabag to Wapenamanda – reconstruction to be financed by AusAID and Wapenamanda to Togoba, 28km tendered by AusAID under TSSP
The presentation revealed the rehabilitation and bringing of the 1,400km of road to maintainable condition would be carried out in stages over 10 years.
FOR MANY YEARS, the organisation AIDS Holistics has promoted a message of Positive Living. We emphasise the importance of nutrition with daily fruit and vegetables. The staple diet in this country is scones made from white flour.
Positive Living is a sick joke for many people in PNG. They simply cannot afford to eat properly.
We read a recent newspaper advertisement for senior positions in the Department of Foreign Affairs. A director receives K32, 000 a year, a net K80 a day. Take out school fees and children’s lunches and that drops to K50. Take out rent and there is no money for food. And this is the salary of a senior officer. Rents in Port Moresby are out of the reach of middle to top ranking workers.
So the family may have to live in a squatter settlement. They have to dig a garden. There is no way a director in Foreign Affairs could live in a rental house and have his family eat adequately on one wage.
A schoolteacher may earn K240 a fortnight, well under the Australian poverty line. A junior teacher will earn much less. This provides K17 a day, enough for a meal of rice and tinned fish once a day and no money for school fees and lunches. It may buy a bag of flour twice a week.
A security officer may live on K150 a fortnight which is K11 a day, provided the family lives in a squatter settlement. No money for school fees and lunches. One meal a day. In off-pay week, the family may not eat for some days. The family will do worse if the man spends some money on beer.
Corruption in this country is about survival. Families steal to eat. Families become desperate when they find traditional land stolen by fake landowner groups. Any chance of a decent future life fades. The desperation intensifies if there are no jobs.
Yet it makes the mind boggle to stand at the side of the road and watch so many people driving the latest land cruiser vehicles worth upwards of K100, 000. How do they pay?
Social injustice is a way of life in this country. We find PNGDF retrenched officers getting no money. Retired correction officers have pensions stopped. They end their days with nothing after a lifetime of loyal service.
Then in the national HIV/AIDS response, we find AusAID and other advisors earning upwards of K500, 000 with house and car. And the Papua New Guinean AIDS workers are mainly volunteers. Social injustice sponsored by Australia.
What would I do if my family were starving and someone left money within reach? I may well steal to stop my children from crying. And I dig a garden where I can.
There is no value in being honest and having children starving. I have to risk ending up in gaol. The English lower classes ended up as convicts in Australia for the same crimes 300 years ago.
To hell with do-gooders crying about corruption. How can we blame mothers for selling their bodies? What of mothers having their roadside goods scattered and stolen by police?
I have seen police taking bags and stuffing money into their pockets as they return to their vehicle eating the betel nut they have confiscated. Their families may eat well tonight.
National Capital rangers think they have the right to hit people with iron bars. They roam the streets looking for people to bash while stealing their goods. Onlookers scurry in the dirt to pick up scattered betel nut.
I stood in the middle of a bashing, a simple old white man, and all violence stopped. The gang leader apologised that I had to witness such an event. Then he took his men around the corner to do the same again.
I stood beside a policeman while he bashed an old man at the market. He stopped. One day I will end up in the cells being bashed.
What would I do as an unemployed PNG father if my daughter was bringing K15 home each day and I knew she was selling her body? I may well do nothing. Thank you daughter. Wife, ask our daughter if she is using a condom.
And my son was giving the family K5 some days after buying homebrew and marijuana? He must be stealing the money. Thank you, son. Your sisters and brothers will not be hungry tonight.
My daughters never have to sell their bodies while I give them money every day for basic needs. What if I died tomorrow?
What is the great lie that PNG mothers tell their children? Do not worry about me, I am not hungry.
Fruit and vegetables from the market are still the cheapest and most nutritious food - kaukau K2, beans K1, carrots 40 toea, kumu 50 toea, with tinned fish K1.90.
Gentle reader, this is not the time to switch off and tell yourself that all is well. Many families do not have K5.50 to go to the market.
PRESIDENT of the PNG Amateur Boxing Union (PNGABU) Lohial Nuau, who is also the head of the Oceania Continental Boxing Confederation (OCBC), has been suspended for two years by its parent body, the International Amateur Boxing Association (AIBA), The National reports.
The penalty meted out by the AIBA executive committee was effective from Dec 18 last year.
The suspension stems from Nuau’s failure to acquit funds annually which AIBA had allocated to the PNGABU for the running of the union’s office as well as claims for consultancy fees and monies for international travel and other “unexplained and/or unreasonable expenses and receipts”, according to a report published on AIBA’s website.
The report was made public last month (June 18) from its headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland.
AIBA’s executive director Ho Kim, in handing down the decision, said Nuau had repeatedly failed to provide the executive committee acquittals for various expenses some of which were dubious in nature.
Although Nuau provided an explanation on Dec 16 last year, which included his OCBC finance report, AIBA found evidence of “numerous unconsiderable (sic) expenses and wrongdoings” from the information provided, and launched its own investigation.
The report described Nuau’s response to be “inadequate” and AIBA’s finance commission chairman David B. Francis further stated:
“I also believe there must be some deeper rooted problems that need investigation”.
The three-term PNGABU president was suspended “from all positions in AIBA with immediate effect” on Dec 18 last year. He received notice to this effect together with attachments related to the case (invoices, proof of payments, etc…) from AIBA’s legal manager Anthony Downes three days later on Dec 21.
Among the findings were Nuau’s claims for apparent office space for the PNGABU in Port Moresby with payments made to Naleai Electrical Contractors Ltd for use of its promises.
However this business can not be located in the company register of PNG.
This company had been receiving payments of US$1000 (K3, 300) a month since Jan 2008 as per an office lease agreement but was later discovered to be the residence of a close acquaintance of Nuau.
Other improprieties uncovered by the investigation were Nuau’s signing of a consultancy agreement with IPAVE Ltd for services in amending the constitution and structure of the OCBC, and not acquitting US$5,000 (K15,000) in travel fares for an aborted trip to Milan, Italy to attend the AIBA world championships.
Again there was no evidence of the existence of IPAVE Ltd in the country’s register of companies nor has Nuau repaid the travel expenses.
The firm was paid US$5,500 (K16, 600) as a result of Nuau’s advice.
The reported stated that from the evidence examined “Nuau improperly engaged in business with related parties, on behalf of the OCBC, which enabled him to obtain an improper benefit at the expense of OCBC.”
An estimated K100, 000 in funds was misused, according to the report; however it added that there was a need for further investigation to determine if other offences were committed.
The report stated in conclusion: “The behaviour of Mr Nuau certainly does not meet the standards that one could reasonably expect from the president of a continental federation and constitutes violations of the AIBA disciplinary code (not the least of which is the principle of integrity).
In a significant move, the report also acknowledged the presence of a working committee which was established within the PNGABU. This committee, formed by concerned associations affiliated to the union, informed AIBA president Dr Ching-Kuo Wu in April this year that it had previously (March 23) challenged in court Nuau’s position as PNGABU president. The Port Moresby District court subsequently ruled in favour of the working committee ordering the country’s overall sports governing body the PNG Sports Federation and Olympic Committee to immediately recognise them. Furthermore, the court ordered that PNGSFOC be restrained from dealings with Nuau and the PNGABU executives. It also ordered all union accounts be frozen. This information was passed on to AIBA’s disciplinary committee.
Nuau and his executive filed in court to have the decision quashed and a recent exparte order (July 6) ruled in favour of the current PNGABU executive.
When contacted yesterday Nuau would not answer questions on his suspension or any related matter.
This week, I was pleasantly surprised to receive some
amazing old photographs of Lae from Denis Murrell, a former teacher at the
iconic BugandiHigh
School. Murrell is now a freelance consultant and writer in China.
He taught at Bugandi from 1968-1971 and is now aged 63, albeit,
with fond memories of Bugandi and Lae the way they used to be.
Murrell’s pictures include those of the school entrance with
the Mercedes-Benz of legendary Bugandi principal (headmaster) Jack Amesbury in
the background.
Entrance
to BugandiHigh School, which
has changed a lot
over the years, with legendary headmaster Jack Amesbury's Mercedes-Benz in the background.-Pictures courtesy of DENIS
MURRELL
Under Amesbury’s guidance, Bugandi became a great and famous
school – a far cry from what it is today - producing many students who went on
to become academic, political and business leaders in Papua New Guinea.
“I was sent to teach at BugandiHigh School
in January, 1968,” Murrell remembers.
Two
teachers responsible for the construction of the Bugandi swimming pool,
Rhys
James and Bernard Swift
“It was my first teaching position apart from a short spell
practice-teaching at GorokaHigh School.
“I saw Bugandi for the first time from the back seat of the
principal’s Mercedes-Benz: a neat set of single and double-storeyed buildings
situated behind lush, green, well-tended parkland and sports ovals bordered
with red canna lilies planted by teacher, Jock Maloney, many years before,
variegated crotons and painted, white stones.
Denis
Murrel (back) in his English class at Bugandi in 1968
“Bugandi had been built on the site of a former swamp, a
place where people said it would be impossible to build anything.
“At first, just 10 acres were cleared of rainforest and a
mess, two houses, a dormitory and two classrooms were built.
“That was in 1959 and amazingly, classes began soon after
Jan 21, 1960.
“The school was called BugandiUpperPrimary School and there
were just 78 students in standards 7, 8 and 9 and three teachers, two from
overseas and one Papua New Guinean.
Work
parade at Bugandi in 1968
“By 1962, the name had been changed to BugandiJunior High School
and in the following year, a man famous throughout the land, Jack Amesbury, was
appointed as principal.
“He worked successive groups of students hard over the
years, to take the land back from the water, fell trees, clear undergrowth,
build roads, plant lawns and gardens and construct playing fields and livestock
pastures and I could see the results of this hard work as I travelled down the
driveway in Jack’s car.
Bugandi
students working in the classroom
“The school had become a full high school in 1965.
“There were 257 students by then, enrolled in forms 1 and 2,
but in 1966, Bugandi began enrolling students from all over the New Guinea mainland
and forms 3 and 4 were begun.
“In 1968, for the first time, 87 boys sat for the
intermediate certificate while another 58 sat for their school certificate examination.
“When I arrived there were problems; Jack was trying to
develop another oval in order to accommodate all the rugby league teams that
played at the school each week, but the trees were found to be full of shrapnel.
Bruce
Owner, teacher at Bugandi in 1969 and 1970
“The area closer to the Markham River had been a
battleground between Australian and Japanese troops in the Second World War and
students often found bits and pieces of Japanese war materiel and occasionally
dangerous, unexploded bombs.
“So after 1968, no new land was opened up and a
consolidation began.
One of
Bugandi's first female teachers, Joyce Stephenson, in 1969
“Existing buildings were improved or extended.
“The last piece of land developed was an Australian football
oval while the last building erected during my stay was a chapel/assembly hall.”
Student
brings in his laundry after work parade
Murrell remembers Amesbury as a stocky, sandy-haired man with
a demanding expression and occasional wry smile, a former Royal Australian Navy
man.
“He had been present on an Australian vessel at Wewak during
the surrender of the Japanese and, consequently, he ran his school like the
huge naval ship that he had been used to.
“Jack always referred to his students, no matter how young,
as ‘men’ and his first words at every assembly were always ‘right men! on deck!’
“The students were up at the crack of dawn to shower in the
ablution blocks.
“They ate a breakfast of wheat-meal cakes with jam and hot
tea in the mess and then listened to the morning news on 9LA as they prepared
for lessons.
“Some boys were rostered each day to keep the area around
their domitories clean and tidy.
Getting ready for work parade at the
Bugandi assembly ground
“They wore government-issued white cotton drill shirts and
navy or khaki shorts.
“Assembly was at seven sharp and no-one, absolutely no-one,
was ever late.
“The assembly area in those days was to the right of the
main drive-way into the school, in front of Jack’s office and the small
staffroom, which was quite inadequate for a staff of 24.
“After assembly, English master, Charles Cazabon, and his
staff, would take all the form one students to the two messes for 20 minutes of
English language drills, while the other students went straight to classes.
“Students were punished for speaking their own village
languages and Tok Pisin.
“They were required to speak English at all times and were
reported to the principal by the prefects if they did not.”
During lessons, Jack Amesbury would often suddenly appear at
a classroom window and take all the boys - Bugandi was a boys’ school in those
days - and the teacher, out to work on the school farm or some other task.
“Classrooms had usually 25 double-desks accommodating up to
50 students per class.
“Sometimes there was a cupboard and for the teacher, there
was a table - but no chair.
“Jack Amesbury didn’t like his teachers to sit down during
their lessons.
“Some teachers would sit on a desk or even on the table but
would always keep a wary eye out for an approaching principal.
“If you were caught sitting during a lesson, you could
expect to be scolded in a way that only Jack could manage, and in front of your
students too.
“Lessons for the students finished at 1pm and were followed
by lunch, usually consisting of kaukau, other vegetables and soup.
“Boys rostered to mess duty helped the cooks to serve and
clean up.
“The school was divided in to four houses and one house had
to do work parade one day per week, all afternoon, until about 4.30.
“Some boys worked on the farm or at caring for the flower
gardens, some cut grass with their serifs around teachers’ homes, while others
cleaned the ablution blocks.
“Some boys worked on special projects like building the new
swimming pool, or constructing the fish ponds, the new chapel/assembly hall or
the tractor shed, while others ran the school tuck-shop operated by the Bantin
Co-operative Society, whose president was Utula Samana.
“Selected boys helped Charles Cazabon in the library and
others helped me to print t-shirts in the art room.
“After work parade, the students could relax until dinner or
perhaps do their laundry.
“Dinner consisted of rice, instead of kaukau, and some green
vegetables like aibika or spinach with some bully-beef or tinned mackerel.
“Immediately after that, from 7 until 9, boys went for night
study in their classrooms, supervised by duty teachers.
“No-one could be late or absent without a good reason and
the duty teacher would count the students present in each room.
“Following that, students were then free for an hour but had
to be in bed by 10pm, lights-out time.
“Students could go into Lae town with permission on
Saturdays and Sundays but they had to be back in their dormitories by midnight
on Saturdays and 10pm on Sundays and the duty teacher and prefects would be
waiting to catch those who might be late.
“There was usually a small group of boys up for punishment
on Monday mornings for being back late.
The school, according to Murrell, had 20 prefects appointed
by Jack Amesbury and presided over by the school captain and his deputy.
“These two students were in control of over 300 boys who not
only studied, ate, slept and worked but who also took part in such things as
debating, art activities, the Cadet Corps, first aid activities, scouting,
civil defence, preparing the school magazine, the Duke of Edinburgh award scheme,
traditional dancing, the organisation of the annual school mumu, and of course,
sport.
“They played rugby league, Australian football, hockey,
basketball, cricket, volleyball and baseball.
“Many teams from all over Lae played in a rugby league
competition held at the school each Saturday and every Bugandi student was
required to take part.
Bugandi
teacher Charles Cazabon and his wife at top town in Lae.He taught at
Bugandi
from 1967 until 1970
“On Friday nights, students watched a 16mm movie flown over
from George Page’s store in Port
Moresby, movies like ‘Elephant Walk’ or ‘Giant’.
“During that first year and during the three further years I
taught at the school, I cannot remember any boy not working hard to prepare for
his future.
“In the late sixties, it was not easy for a boy to go to
high school and boys who were selected used their lucky chance wisely.
“They knew that any boy who didn’t follow the Bugandi way of
doing things could be immediately dismissed and sent back to his village."
Last Friday evening, I was at the Weigh Inn Hotel
at Konedobu, having a quite yarn with former kiap (patrol officer) Graham Pople, already the subject of two
articles in The National’s Weekender
about Papua New Guinea
as it used to be.
Graham Pople besides a picture of the Port Moresby Post Office in its heyday.-Picture by MALUM NALU
Response to the two articles, which touched on
his memories about his kiap days, has
been quite phenomenal and I asked him why kiaps
could conduct a census on foot in those days while government officers with
millions of kina can’t do likewise in 2010.
Preparing for a census in Laiagam in 1959.-Pictures by GRAHAM POPLE
An interesting point, as earlier last week, the
much talked-about 2010 census had been deferred to 2011 because of various
reasons including “insufficient funding”.
It’s early days yet, however, this could have
adverse effects on services such as health, education, infrastructure,
law-and-order, the much-vaunted Vision 2050 and even the 2012 national
elections.
Pople’s never-before-published autobiography and
patrol diaries contain reminisces of his days as a kiap and Member of the first Papua and New Guinea House of Assembly
in 1964.
Traditional bridge over a river in Laiagam
Simply titled The Popleography, it gives a fascinating insight into life in the
then Territory of Papua and New Guinea in those far-off
pre-independence days, as well as the first House of Assembly.
Pople writes candidly about how he conducted a
census and law-and-order in Laiagam, Enga province (then part of Western Highlands) in 1959.
Indeed food for thought as I wondered what has
gone wrong and why national statistical office staff had conducted the cardinal
sin of not conducting a census in its scheduled year: something that had never
been done before.
“Most of my time while at Laiagam was spent in
patrolling,” he remembers.
Haus kuk (cook house) for a patrol in Laiagam in 1959
“My initial job was to go around the valley
recording names in village, clan and lineage groups.
“Recorded some 65,000 names in the LagaipValley.
Getting a log for a bridge in Laiagam, then part of Western Highlands, in 1959
“Every day was also a court day.
“Court day often meant just that, but often it
was more of a mediation process.
A typical camp site in the Highlands
“If a dispute could be settled amicably by
paying pigs or shell than that was the chosen way to do it.
“Prison terms were often given that but that was
mainly for assaults or garden theft or rioting and fighting.
“There was no paid labour on the government
station and all upkeep was done by the prisoners.
“They had no complaints.
“They were houses and fed and generally happy
for their period in gaol.
“They knew they had done something wrong and
accepted it.
“The only escapes were when someone heard that
his wife was playing up or a child was sick or his pig had been killed.
“But application to the POIC (patrol officer in
charge) was often given a sympathetic hearing and he was allowed out in the
custody of his village leader or luluai.
“The capacity of the prison was space limited to
about 30 occupants.
“On one occasion, there was a tribal fight in
which two major clans were involved and some 400 warriors were sentenced by me
to a gaol term.
“It was impossible for me to accommodate them,
so after discussions with the two luluais involved it was agreed that each clan
would work on the section of the road through their tribal areas for the term
of their gaol sentence.
“They would sleep in their own houses and their
wives/mothers would bring food to where they were working.
“A daily roll call, to ensure attendance, would
be held.
“It worked very well and everybody benefitted with
the road work that was completed during the two-month period.
“They knew that they had done wrong and accepted
the punishment, but were happy to have the trust-like system which allowed them
to sleep in their warm houses as opposed to the prison where their only warmth
would come from a blanket or two.
“In 1969, 10 years later when I returned to the
area, several of them pointed out with pride the work they had done on the
road.
“This was no resentment.”
Pople first arrived in Mt Hagen, Western
Highlands, in 1959 and served places such as Jimi, Tambul, Tomba, Wabag,
Laiagam, Porgera, Mt Kare, Koroba (Southern Highlands), Kandep, Minj and Banz.
“At this time,” he recalls, “Mt Hagen was
growing rapidly but shopping was rudimentary to say the least.
“Danny Leahy has a small store not far from
where we lived and there were a couple of other small stores on our side of
town.
“On the other side, where the people lived,
there were better stores, and if memory serves me well, they were New Guinea
Company, Steamships and Burns Philp.
“Hagen was a centre for coffee-growing which was growing
rapidly at that time in the Highlands.
“In later years, that spread to tea-growing but
that had not yet started when I first arrived there.”
Tambul, at 7,300ft and the highest station in
the Territory of New Guinea at that stage, had an
airstrip that was capable of taking DC3 and similar larger aircraft.
Wabag airstrip was at 6,700ft above sea level
and built on a sloping ridge with an approach up the valley, a lift on to the
end of the airstrip and then full-throttle to climb to the parking bay.
Whilst Pople was at Laiagam, there was always
talk of gold at Progera, but he had resolved to stay out of anything to do with
Porgera gold and, though offered gold on many occasions, never bought any.
In 1960, Pople was posted to Minj, “which had
only been opened in 1957, when Barry Griffin had been sent to pacify the
warring locals and open a station”.
“They were an offshoot of the middle Wahgi
people and had close affiliations with the people from North
Wahgi area.
“There were about 25,000 of them living in the
headwaters of the middle Jimi and about another 500 scattered through a large
area in the lower Jimi.
“Mt Wilhelm was part of the watershed of the
Jimi and the valley dropped down to about 4,500ft near the station to under
1,000ft in the sparsely-populated lower Jimi.
“They were still fighting and there were two
mission stations operating.
“One was the Catholic Mission at the foot of Mt
Wilhelm at the head of the JimiRiver and the other was operated by the Anglican
Mission on the north side of the JimiRiver.”
Minj and Banz in the great WahgiValley
were also two other places which Pople resided in and remain close to his heart
after almost a half-century.
I’ll leave the last word about him camping one
time at Karepuga in Mt Kare in 1959, which some 29 years later, in 1988, would
be the scene of PNG’s biggest-ever gold rush.
“We camped in grassland but at the edge of light
bush at an altitude of 9,500ft.
“The bush provided some relief from the winds
and we all had a better sleep.
“This camp was just to the north of Pinuni creek
and only a kilometre away from the area which was to provide the source of the
biggest gold rush in PNG history some 29 years later.
A VOTE of no-confidence in Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare is imminent, Western Governor Dr Bob Danaya warned last night, The National reports.
But timing is crucial, as anyone wanting to remove the prime minister has only six months, between now and Dec 31, to do so. The Constitution does not allow any vote of no-confidence in a prime minister 18 months before the next general elections.
PNG will go to the polls in a general election in July or August 2012.
“The game is on now. The opposition will move a vote of no-confidence, but I do not know what strategy they will use,” Danaya said.
A legal source told The National anyone wanting to move a vote must give seven days notice first when Parliament is sitting. At present, there is no notice of a vote of no-confidence before Parliament, so one would have to be introduced on July 20 when Parliament next sits, or in November when it sits for the budget.
“Time may be on their (government) side.
“There is only six months, and they could juggle the number of sitting days remaining to suit themselves. That will happen unless factions within government block it,” the legal source said.
Just 24 hours after the Supreme Court struck down provisions of the Integrity Law (OLIPPAC), talks were swirling in Waigani of secret meetings by different factions within the government, and the ruling National Alliance party, but no one was coming out to confirm or deny anything.
A number of party leaders contacted by The National refused to comment
publicly on how they see the decision of the top court, its implications
and what they might do.
But leader of the Melanesian Liberal Party Dr Allan Marat, who was recently sacked as attorney-general, was forthright about his view of the government.
He said if there was a move to change the government, he would fully support those who make such a move.
“I will support the change of government because I have seen the current government’s trend towards dictatorship; the greed of leaders and, when I spoke openly about it, I got kicked out as you all know.
“I was, then, speaking about leadership; the OLIPPAC provisions that have been found to be ‘unconstitutional’ were encouraging the ‘stability in government that saw the end in itself’.
“The deliverance of transparency and good governance were not there. I spoke up against it, and I was sacked.
“So, I will support the move for changes in government.”
Marat’s MLP is a coalition partner in the current government. Under OLIPPAC, he would not have voted against the prime minister he helped put in after the elections.
But, that has changed now with the court decision on Wednesday.
MPs are no longer bound by their party resolutions, and parties are no longer bound by their votes after the general election.
Southern Highlands Governor Anderson Agiru, an avid supporter of the prime minister, is confident Sir Michael will see out his final term on top, but urged him to change “non-performing” ministers.
“Now is the time to demonstrate real leadership. Now is the time to take stock of who had turned up for work and who has been sleeping.
“If ministers have not been performing, they must go. Quality leaders sitting in the backbench of government, and in the opposition, should be given an opportunity if they put their hand up,” Agiru said.
He said the highlands region had been given a raw deal in the past, and the government must now shift its focus and resources to important infrastructure like the Highlands Highway.
Works, Transport and Civil Aviation Minister Don Polye, who is deputy leader of NA, said stability had brought investment and opportunities to the country never seen before, and must continue.
“We respect the decision of the court.
“OLIPPAC is out but, as leaders, we should not lean too much on the law to provide a stable environment for growth.
“As leaders, we should provide this in the way we behave and conduct ourselves. If we serve our constituents with honesty, stability will prevail without the need for such laws.”
Polye has 11 men in his highlands faction of NA, giving him pole position to take over leadership of the party when Sir Michael steps down.
The prime minister has kept the cards up his sleeve, and could play them now to beat any vote.
Parliament recently gave him approval to increase Cabinet from 28 to 32. He could play that to appease resentments.
He could also give away “economic” portfolios perceived to be concentrated in one region.
