Aussies come good

Staff of the Australian High Commission and their families have given infants confined to the special care nursery at the Port Moresby General Hospital a new lease in life, The National reports.
Yesterday, Roxanne Martens, wife of Australian High Commissioner to PNG Ian Kemish, delivered 10 boxes (or 1,000 pieces) of naso-gastric tubes to nursery staff at the hospital.
Money to buy the tubes was raised by high commission staff and their families during their Christmas party last year.
The thin, flexible tubes are inserted through the nose of premature and sick infants, who cannot feed naturally, so that they could be fed their milk and medication.
Martens also took time out to visit some of the babies kept at the nursery under the guidance of sister-in-charge Maria Bernard. – Nationalpic by EKAR KEAPU

Lae confident for basketball tourney

By MALUM NALU


From left (back) are Russell Stafford, Joe Giali, Peter Buala, Lawrence Lahari (coach), Richard Soba, Jonathan Orme and Mika Laho while front are Wayne Aaron, Junior Oscar, Percy Aaron and Michael Kramer.-Picture by BOB AARON

 Lae is quietly confident of doing well in this weekend’s Port Moresby invitational tournament at the Sir John Guise Stadium in Port Moresby.
The tournament brings together the finest talent in the country at the moment from Port Moresby, Tubusereia, Exodus club and Lae.
Staunch supporter and former Papua New Guinea international Bob Aaron, who is also one of the sponsors of the team, said the Lae team would use the tournament as build-up to the Jan 28-31 Far North Queensland All Stars competition, as well as this years Pacific Games.
He also made an 11th-hour appeal to potential sponsors to chip and help the Lae team, following Wednesday’s K25, 000 sponsorship of the Port Moresby Papuan Blacks by Pacific MMI to the same tournament.
“Most of our players are young students and are part of the national development squad,” Aaron said from Lae.
“This will be a stepping stone for the Pacific Games this year.”
Aaron said the youngsters from Lae had been undergoing training since last November, and with players from Yanga and Butibam villages in top form following last month’s Ahi Festival, would be out to give the rest a run for their money.

Well known Catholic brother goes finish

Br Hugo Audrey SVD

By SIR PETER BARTER

Well-known and respected Br Hugo Audrey bid farewell to Madang and Papua New Guinea this week when he left for his home in Switzerland.
Br Hugo was well known the the students of Divine Word University where he was in charge of transport  logistics and almost personally welcomed every new student over the past decade who attended the university.
Several farewell dinners were organised to farewell him and when Sir Peter found out that he had never travelled in a helicopter, he was taken on a helicopter trip of Madang and the harbour which he later told those who farwelled him the memory would last in his memory forever.
Apart from Br Hugo's transport work, he was an accomplished musician and often gave rescitals with his 2m long Alpen Horn and blew the Last  Post and Reveille at all Anzac and Commemoration Day parades in Madang.
He also was an enthusiastic historian who wrote several books and diaries on the history of Madang and PNG including a diary of Nicholai Maclay, the first white settler in New Guinea.
Br Hugo was awarded a Logohu Medal for the contribution he made in PNG.

Road projects face threat

Donors issue warning

 

KEY aid donors, partnering the government in infrastructure development, are threatening to re-direct their aid programme unless the national government moves swiftly to restore integrity and transparency in its tender procurement and financial accountability systems and processes.

Sources within the donor community revealed last night that AusAID was not particularly keen to continue with the current manner of engagement with the government after a three-year major road maintenance contract under its transport sector service improvement programme (TSSIP), which would have started in 2009, fell through due to political heavy-handedness and interference.

The project involved the resealing and maintenance of a part of the Highlands Highway between Lae in Morobe and Goroka in the Eastern Highlands.

Reports said in 2009, AusAID’s “no objection letter” recommended a K53 million bid by Shorncliffe, a well established and reputable road sealing company in PNG, to undertake the road maintenance project. The technical evaluation committee also affirmed AusAID’s recommendation.

However, between the Central Supply and Tenders Board (CSTB), which considered and approved the donor recommendation, and the national executive council (NEC), “the figures changed to K65 million, an increase of total contract cost by an unreasonable K13 million which is exorbitant and well outside the tender process consideration”.

“To our surprise and dismay, the names of the recommended contractors also changed.

“The implementation of the project has been delayed and no work has started.

“We have tried to salvage the project through re-tendering but this has deliberately been delayed without any real work being done.”

The same practice had been identified in a number of other key contracts in the country.

Deputy Prime Minister and Works Minister Sam Abal had stopped all projects which were of questionable status pending a thorough review.

The awarding of two road maintenance contracts, valued at K20 million in the highlands, had also come under question.

Reports claimed that two contractors with no equipment and financial capacity had been awarded the projects.

It was understood that Abal had directed Works secretary Joel Luma to convene an urgent reconciliation meeting of aid donors within the infrastructure sector in a bid to streamline the various development aid packages and leverage them against the government’s overall development strategic and plans relating to infrastructure.  

 

 

Finance inquiry returns to court

IT is back to the courts again for the government in its bid to strike out an injunction preventing the publication of and further action on the Commission of Inquiry into the Finance Department, The National reports.

The matter is one of the 40 cases that former judge Mark Sevua had carriage of and which he will now not be able to attend to because he is no longer a judge.

Sevua had the case for seven months and, despite repeated requests from government lawyers, failed to discharge the matter until his departure when the Judicial and Legal Services Commission refused to extend his term in office.

The former judge told the media last week that he regretted having to leave so many cases unfinished.

Chief secretary Manasupe Zurenuoc yesterday revealed his own displeasure at the lengthy delay in revealing the inquiry report to the people.

 “I have to ask my lawyers to go back to court and start all over again,” Zurenuoc said.

“I feel totally helpless. I am embarrassed that I have not been able to deliver.

“All systems of State have a responsibility to ensure there is an outcome on the commission of inquiry. I have a responsibility to the people of PNG.

“Millions of kina has been spent.”

The inquiry was completed and handed to the Prime Minister on Nov 6, 2009. Last March 4, it was tabled in parliament but two days later, an injunction was taken to stop its publication.

From then until now, the matter has been in the courts and now the judge handling the case has been forced to leave the bench.

Manasupe said a full secretariat has been established to implement the findings but which will now have to wait until the injunction is lifted.

And for that to happen, the chief secretary indicated he would have to reinstitute the action to life the injunction with new lawyers.

 

 

 

New Ireland takes on free education

By ELIZABETH VUVU

 

ELEMENTARY up to Grade 8 students in New Ireland will receive free education this year, The National reports.

A special provincial executive council meeting on Wednesday reaffirmed the free education policy for the sector throughout the province.

Governor Sir Julius Chan said in a statement that students attending Grades 9-12 and vocational centres were entitled to a 75% subsidy while all tertiary institutions and universities would pay a fixed K1, 200.

“We are investing far more in education than is known to the public because our budget spending on school maintenance, for instance, is more than K5.4 million this year with more than K10 million for new high schools.”

The governor said based on these allocations, there was no need for schools to impose project fees as was the case previously.

“However, I am not against genuine desire towards achieving self-reliance by schools if projects are properly identified and transparent reporting and clear completion dates are given.”

He said such fees must be sanctioned by the provincial director for education.

Meanwhile, K31 million was approved for priority health improvement.

Sir Julius had directed provincial administrator Simeon Malai to investigate, confirm and coordinate reports of water and food shortages in communities from the growing intensity of the drought experienced in the province.

He said the health plan would counter the slide in indicators in New Ireland with the closure of 21 aid posts, high prevalence of malaria, high infant mortality rate and the desire to bring efficient basic services to the rural areas.

National Court stops all LNG payments

By SAMUEL RAITANO

 

THE National Court has stopped further payment of LNG funds to landowners by the government departments until proper landowner identification and other aspects surrounding pending court cases were dealt with in a mediation process on site at the project impacted areas, The National reports.

Justice Ambeng Kandakasi, who made the orders on Wednesday, also ordered all banks stop any transaction of LNG funds, freeze all accounts containing LNG seed capital and MoA funds and disclose all the details of the current accounts containing LNG funds in the name of transparency.

The orders do not deny the rights of genuine landowners from getting their share of seed capital and banking them, but is to prevent further fraud and misappropriation and ensure money was given to the right people.

This followed numerous applications made to the court over issues surrounding disagreements on landownership and funds ending up in the wrong hands.

Kandakasi said there were many cases brought to court that “smelt of fraud” and all normal payouts and transactions of funds would resume as soon as a new draft of conflict management mechanism, via alternative dispute resolution, was in place by next month to address and control the progress of participation by all stakeholders in the LNG project.

This will relieve the courts from a lot of LNG-related cases.

Kandakasi referred to Post Courier’s Tuesday front page about landowners forcing the closure of LNG operations in Hides 4, and said that such events would not have arisen if proper awareness and deals were made on site where people “on the land” witnessed and agreed to terms and conditions with the state and developers.

The judge advised the landowners to start identifying their clans and traditional boundaries rather than having expatriates and outsiders do it for them.

Kandakasi called on the landowners to refrain from closing the progress of the LNG as a mechanism to enable and satisfy their grievances was being worked on by the court.