Encouraging special and inclusive education

The University of Goroka last Friday opened its first special and inclusive play area for students with special educational needs at Okiufa Primary School in Eastern Highlands province.

The facilities were officially opened by the acting vice chancellor of UOG Dr Sam Najike.

 “This is a special occasion as we are embarking on something crucial for integral, holistic education in PNG,” he said.

"We must create opportunities for these special groups of children.”

Chair of the PNG Disabled Persons Association, Ipul Powaseu, thanked UOG staff for recognising that inclusivity was important.

 “Children with disabilities still have the right to go to school,” she said.

 Powaseu also encouraged all present to fight for those with disabilities and to help children with disabilities to go to school.

The cutting of the ribbon to formally open the special and inclusive play area was performed by Dr Najike, dean of the faculty of education Dr Kapa Kelep-Malpo and Powaseu.

Head of the special and inclusive education strand at UOG, Donna Mailil, said: “The real point of the project was to help the school to develop an environment for effective learning so schools can continue to further develop inclusive education.”

The project undertaken by UOG focused on students majoring in special and inclusive education working to better implement the policy of inclusive education in 6 schools around Goroka, and to promote and support inclusive learning and teaching.

 The inclusive play environment opened at Okiufa Primary School was designed to assist children with special educational needs to equally participate in all activities whilst attending school. 

 

Update on the oilfields

Grades 3 and 4 children of Ted Diro Primary School in Port Moresby getting straight into The Oilfield books donated by Oil Search Ltd. Similar donations have been made to other schools in the city, The National reports.
The books give an insight on the petroleum industry in Papua New Guinea. – Picture courtesy of Oil Search

Landowners' initiative needed to win LNG contracts

RESOURCE landowners must take the initiative instead of waiting for government to help them participate in the country’s resource development projects, The National reports.

Chhairman of the Hides Gas Resources Ltd (HGRL), the licenced-based landowner company in petroleum development licence 1 (PDL1) area of Hides in Southern Highlands province, Willy Wandiya said this to landowners.

Citing their  struggles to get a contract in the K40 billion LNG project, he said it was time landowners looked beyond PNG government.

Recently, HGRL signed a deal with an international human resource company Brunel International to supply LNG project with its labour and human resource needs.

“The more we rely on the government, the more our chances are of missing out on lucrative business opportunities,” Wandiya said.

“The government does not have the money … it is incapacitated,” he said.

Wandiya said  the government did  not have the capacity and the technical know-how for such project like the PNG LNG.

“The government is only there to facilitate,” he said, adding that the   government   is financially inadequate to finance its own equity share in the gas project.

“The government will also have to borrow to finance its equity share in the project.”

Because of this, Wandiya has urged landowners to have foresight.

“We must look beyond the early works, beyond the first LNG shipment, the first royalties, the first spin-off benefits to see ourselves after the project and what our children and grandchildren would say about how we handled their future,” he said.

 

Ban phone lottery

 ‘Means of bringing gambling right into the homes of Papua New Guineans’

 

By ALISON ANIS

 

THE national government has come under pressure to stop the recently launched mobile phone lottery, and to audit the books of regulator National Gaming Control Board, The National reports.

Since the newest way of gambling, using the mobile phone, was launched two weeks ago, there had been widespread debate about how this would be regulated, and whether minors were being exposed in the same way as they were to the illegal horserace machines.

Women and church groups were adding to the growing voice to stop this gambling and its threat to children.

President of the National Council of Women (NCW) Scholar Kakas and the president of the Catholic Bishop Conference (CBC) in PNG and the Solomon Islands, Archbishop Francesco Panfilo, yesterday spoke out against mobile phone lottery.

They said the claim that this form of gambling would “make millionaires out of everyone in a transparent and accountable way” was nonsense.

They said the lottery concept, supervised by the National Gaming Control Board (NGCB) and played using Digicel PNG network, would bring more poverty in families and communities.

PNG is the first country in the South Pacific to launch mobile lottery even ahead of its developed neighbours, Australia and New Zealand.

“This is dangerous nonsense.

“Even our developed neighbours, Australia and New Zealand, do not permit mobile phone lotteries because they are so hard to regulate,” Panfilo said in statement.

He said gambling, through mobile phone networks, had opened up gates for simple and poor people in the villages to spend their money on gambling.

“There will be less money for food and other necessities and more family problems as the punters would be tempted to spend their earnings in pursuit of a hopeless dream,” he added.

Kakas, in support, said: “There is definitely no way that the lottery would make millionaires out of everybody in a transparent and accountable way.

“This is all a big lie because there will be no control or proper monitoring in place of people gambling on phone.

“We have enough problems with pokies and horse-racing and are sure to experience more problems with the introduction of mobile lottery.

“How will we know if our children below the age of 18 are not involved?” Kakas asked.

She said the voice prompt on customer service number (150), which says: “Elders will have to control this” was not an effective regulatory method.

Panfilo argued there was no way to keep track of the age of those playing.

“This means that a child who wins will not get his prize

unless they lie and give their phone to an older person.

“From what we know of the youth of PNG, students and children will spend their own and their parents’ money on gambling.

“Employers who provide mobile phone credits to their employees will face the same problems,” Panfilo said.

According to media reports, 10% of the profits raised through mobile phone gambling would go towards developing youth and sports programmes in the communities. 

“Similar promises in the past were not fulfilled.

“As far as we know, NGCB has never presented a financial report to parliament as required under its relevant act. We simply do not know where the money goes to,” a Catholic Bishop’s Conference media statement said yesterday.

“On Saturday, we might see a few poor people win a lot of money and rise out of poverty, at least, temporarily.

“Everyone else who participates will be worse off and there will be an increase in the number of people addicted to gambling.”

The Catholic bishops also called on the public to send the mobile phone company a message: “To leave their phones at home for a day.”

They warned that if the scheme continues, the churches of PNG may organise something more drastic.

About a fortnight ago, Anglimp-South Waghi MP Jamie Maxtone-Graham called on Digicel PNG to abandon its

plan to introduce lotto on its network.

He said the last thing this country needed was easy access to affordable gambling avenue.

 

 

Opposition highlights policies

By JEFFREY ELAPA

 

A GOVERNMENT led by Abau MP Sir Puka Temu will invest heavily in education, The National reports.

Sir Puka said yesterday the opposition was confident of moving a successful vote of no-confidence against the government when parliament resumes in two weeks, and he felt the need to go ahead and outline some of the opposition’s major policies as an alternative government.

He said they would focus on the education sector to address the needs of more than 50% of school-age children in the country who had missed out on basic education every year.

“A government that invests in its human resource is a good government and, therefore, PNG must invest in its human resource to compete in the region and on the international arena,” he said.

Sir Puka said another key policy would be to revive the public service machinery for the good of the nation.

He said those who had not performed would go and allow for competent and committed officers to serve the people through the implementation of effective policies and a change in attitudes and work commitments.

He said transparency and accountability among all public office holders would be a major focus of the alternate government to effect public service functions and processes and allow for services to trickle down to the people.

“We will also make sure that financial management procedures are resurrected to ensure all public funds are channelled in a transparent and accountable manner,” Sir Puka said.

He said the alternate government would make sure that the functions and roles of the Ombudsman Commission were reviewed to give it greater powers and autonomy in dealing with corrupt leadership.

 

 

Hillary Clinton arrives in Port Moresby today

UNITED States secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton will arrive in Port Moresby today, The National reports.

Clinton is expected at about 4pm for a four-hour visit before leaving for New Zealand and Australia concluding her Asia-Pacific tour.

Details of her visit had been withheld by the US embassy for security reasons.

However, it was understood that the visit would focus on US assistance to PNG and discussing climate change and women issues.

During her meeting with Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare, Clinton will discuss the energy governance and capacity initiative (EGCI), the US embassy said in a media statement yesterday.

EGCI is a US department of state-led global effort to provide a range of valuable technical support to governments of selected countries that are on the verge of becoming the world’s next generation of oil and gas producers.

“As Papua New Guinea begins to develop its liquefied natural gas (LNG) resources, the US state department hopes to assist the PNG government, especially the Department of Petroleum and Energy as well as tax and finance agencies, to maximise value and efficiency of oil and gas production and revenue flows,” the statement added.

It said EGCI would seek to bolster institutional capacities related to governance, revenue management and technical capability.

“EGCI will provide Papua New Guinea with access to top US government talent with unmatched global expertise on issues related to petroleum geology, upstream licensing, exploration and production operations, revenue management, sector regulation, policy reform and implementation and energy sector finance and tax structure.

“EGCI also builds both high-level and working contacts to offer unbiased, sound advice and guidance as well as lasting relationships that can further long-term institutional stability and sound sector governance,” the embassy said.  

After her arrival, the US secretary of state would pay a courtesy call on Governor-General Sir Paulias Matane at Government House and partake in a mangrove planting exercise at Idubada.

Climate change was also a key component of Clinton’s visit and she would hold talks on the issue with Sir Michael at Parliament House this evening.

She would also meet prominent PNG women leaders where issues on gender equality and nominated women representation in parliament would be discussed.

Lands Department accused of “corruption, negligence” in Western province

By MALUM NALU

Western province chamber of commerce and industry says Lands secretary Pepi Kimas may have been negligent when he issued leases over 1.25 million hectares of customary land in the North Fly district  on Sept 23 this year.

A landowners’ meeting, the subject of an AAP report published in The National last Friday, was told that there was prime facie evidence that Kimas and/or his responsible officers had acted “at best negligently and possibly corruptly” when he issued the three leases.

“Firstly, the lease over the 632,538 ha. In the Nomad District was issued by the secretary in the name of Tosigiba Investment Ltd,” chamber acting president Warren Dutton said yesterday (Tuesday, November 02, 2010).

“The chairman of the Tosigiba Timber Group Ltd, which was incorporated 1996, and which has 79 of its 82 issued shares held by integrated land groups (ILGs) which represent the customary landowners of much but definitely all of the land included within the lease boundaries, told the meeting that he had no knowledge of or connection with Tosigiba Investment Ltd, in whose name the lease over his people’s land had been issued.

“Secondly, the chairman and others from the Nomad area told the meeting that they had negotiated with the proposed developer to give them (timber) rights over a corridor 5km either side of the road alignment, which the developer agreed to construct in consideration for those rights.”

Dutton said the area over which they had agreed to give these rights would be approximately 100,000ha; however, Kimas had issued a special agricultural and business lease for 99 years over all the land owned by all of the members of all the 79 ILGs.

He said this included all of the land of all of all of the other villages living in the Nomad district who were not party to the negotiations for the road alignment.

“Not one village house, nor one sago tree is excluded from this lease,” Dutton said.

“The lease is also issued over the top of long-existing leases for mission purposes.

“How can the secretary of Lands be so credulous as to believe that any Papua New Guinean Villager would or could be prepared to cede absolutely all of his land to the State for 99 years?

“Surely he, or his responsible officers, should have referred back to the Kiunga and Nomad district lands officers for confirmation that all the villagers really did agree to give away absolutely all of their land.

“By not doing so, surely he has acted, at least, negligently in the performance of his statutory duties.”