Former PM O’Neill confident of forming Govt after GE22
News that matter in Papua New Guinea
Former PM O’Neill
confident of forming Govt after GE22
PORT MORESBY: The People’s National Congress party
remains confident of forming the next Government to put Papua New Guinea (PNG)
back on the right track, party leader Peter O’Neill says.
“I am forming the
Government because the country needs experienced people (leaders). We also want
to see a fair distribution of services to all people,” he added.
PNG Cyber Monitor reproduces below a few GE22 news updates as published by The National:
O’Neill confident of
forming govt
July 1, 2022The NationalMain Stories
“I’m forming this government because the country needs experienced people.
“The PNC (also) wants to see a fair distribution of services to all people.”
He was at Nebilyer in Western Highlands yesterday to support PNC candidate Dr
George Bopi who is contesting the seat held by Pangu party member Win Bakri
Daki.
O’Neill said the PNC had experienced people such as Dr Bopi to take the nation
forward, and to continue the major developments people had been witnessing in
the eight years up to May 2019.
O’Neill promised to bring back the free education policy his government had
started, but he said was not taken seriously by the Pangu-led government of his
successor James Marape.
He said the free education policy allowed around two million children to go to
school.
The number has now dropped to around one million.
“The PNC will allow free education from elementary to grade 12.
“We will also do away with loans obtained by tertiary students and make sure no
child misses out on education,” O’Neill said.
“This government (did) not continue from where I left off.”
He said students who could not make it to tertiary institution could join the
national security programme.
O’Neill defended his government’s decision to obtain loans for major
infrastructure development.
“We borrowed (money) to work,” he said.
Workers must be allowed to vote, says Sinai
Businesses should operate as normal on Monday
until the end of polling on July 22 but must allow their employees to cast
their votes, Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai says.
“It is Papua New Guineans’ democratic right to elect their leaders every five
years.
“So, employers are obliged to give time to their employees to exercise their
right and responsibility to the nation,” he added.
Sinai said polling stations had been set up away from the business centres
within the cities to avoid inconvenience that would disrupt the polling
process.
“Shops, restaurants and night clubs that operate from morning till midnight can
make special arrangements for their employees to cast their ballots.”
Sinai added that people would still need to eat and go shopping and would need
businesses houses to remain open for business so it would not be convenient for
them to close on Monday.
“Employees can work in shifts so that they all get to vote,” Sinai said.
Meanwhile, Bank South Pacific Financial Group Ltd chief executive officer Robin
Fleming said employees would be allowed time to go and cast their votes.
“In areas where there is one-day polling this will mean that there may be some
customer inconvenience with our staff rotating throughout the day,” he said.
Son keen to carry
legacy
July 1, 2022The
NationalMain Stories
The young Somare, who had lived most of his life in Wewak, said he was
passionate to continue his late father’s legacy.
He is among others contesting incumbent Governor Allan Bird for the regional
seat in the General Election 2022 (GE22).
For a private person like Michael Jnr, he had been involved with politics all
his life.
The Somare children had travelled with their father on that political journey,
the late Grand Chief embarked on prior to the country gaining Independence in 1975.
“I’ve been involved with politics all my life,” he said.
In 1994, he returned to Wewak after attending the PNG University of Technology
and operated his business.
Michael Jnr said his father worked hard and brought impact projects and money
into the country between 2002 and 2011.
But he said the money got caught up in the system.
His sibling, Dulciana Somare Brash, also an independent, is contesting
incumbent MP Salio Waipo for the Angoram Open seat.
Michael Jnr said: “This is a personal journey for me. A lot of things in the
province were not done the way my father had wished.
“My father has always been about helping people.
He said to relocate the Boram hospital to Wirui but no one listened. Now the
tide keeps coming in, the hospital had to be pulled down.
“There is law and order issues in the province because there are no jobs.
“No tangible development in the province in the last five years.
“It’s exhausting for me who lives in the province to not see any impact
project.”
Morobe polling official highlights
shortcomings
TIME is against
Morobe’s returning officers (ROs) as some of the materials they need to
transport to rural districts are still in Lae, a spokesman says.
Wau-Waria RO Fidelis Harrisol said the training of polling officials had not
been conducted with polling starting next week.
“We also do not have in hand the gazetted polling schedules,” he said.
He said all polling dates and locations had to be gazetted and polling could
not be run if the ROs and their assistants did not have this.
The scrutineers forms had to be distributed so that respective candidates could
direct them to locations of polling at a given date.
Harrisol also pointed out that the new Wau-Waria electorate was isolated and
the only means of transportation for election materials was by air.
“At the moment, all materials for the polling and counting are still in Lae.
This may be also true for other electorates such as Kabwum, Tewai-Siassi and
others.”
Harrisol said they were also yet to brief scrutineers on what they were
expected to do during the polling and counting.
He added that payment for polling officials would be another area that would
need to be addressed.
“We need to have access to that money early, hopefully tomorrow so that those
service providers who helped during polling can be paid off.”
He said Morobe’s ROs were concerned with these issues and hoped that
authorities addressed these areas quickly and effectively with polling set to
begin on Monday.
Pruaitch claims National Alliance can turn
economy around
A POLTICAL party formerly in government says
it can turn the country’s ailing prospects and build a brighter future for all
Papua New Guineans.
National Alliance (NA) leader Patrick Pruaitch told public rallies in his
Aitape-Lumi electorate in West Sepik that his party had done it before after
the depressing situation from 1999 to 2002 and could do it again in 2022.
The NA Leader said PNG experienced significant economic growth from 2002 to
2011 under an NA-led government but since then the economy became stagnant.
He said the country had risen from the depths of recession in 2002 under an NA
government and grew over more than a decade before slowing down by 2014.
“For a resource-rich country like PNG this is a sad outcome. Under NA, per
capita income rose from K198.81 in 2002 to K566.53 by 2007.”
Speaking at an Aitape-Lumi rally, Pruaitch claimed that the governments of
Prime Ministers
Peter O’Neill and James Marape had damaged PNG’s economic potential and prospects
through excessive borrowing and expenditure.
“Former Prime Minister O’Neill keeps talking about spending on infrastructure
but ignores the fact that such spending is questionable in the face of falling
employment levels during his seven years in office. O’Neill never addressed
falling job numbers while in office, and now claims he will create 500,000 jobs
in the next five years.
“The lost years under O’Neill and Marape are a sad legacy. In their war of
words, they compare their dismal performances against each other’s record, but
never against the NA Government’s 2002 to 2011 success story.”
“As the leader of the National Alliance Party I am fully committed to policy
changes that will create a vibrant and growing private sector with rising
domestic and foreign investments,” Pruaitch said.
Pruaitch said NA was not making rash and unachievable promises and was
confident that the party has good, sensible policies that is needed to shift
the economy around and to create many thousands of jobs to address unemployment.
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