Temu defends Petromin board
ACTING Prime Minister and Minister for Lands and Mining Dr Puka Temu yesterday dismissed claims by shadow minister for mining Francis Awesa that the board of Petromin Ltd was ‘handpicked’ by the Government.
Dr Temu said Mr Awesa’s claim is a direct attack on the integrity and professionalism of the members of the board.
He said the appointments were done after a mandatory ‘fit and proper’ test, which also involved the police, Ombudsman Commission and the Registrar of Companies.
“Board chairman Brown Bai is an eminent Papua New Guinean, who has a proven track record at such senior management positions.
“He has also been appointed to numerous top management positions by past governments,” Dr Temu said.
He said other members like Prof Geoff Heal from the University of Columbia, William Searson the first secretary of the Department of Mining/Petroleum and a geologist by profession, and Kerenga Kua, the president of the PNG Law Society, are people who have high standings in society.

Share and save: Lupari
By HARLYNE JOKU
CHIEF Secretary Isaac Lupari has urged Government agencies to share their resources in order to cut down costs in service delivery.
Mr Lupari made the remarks after the signing of a MoU by Telikom managing director Peter Loko and NBC counterpart Joseph Ealedona at the heads of departments meeting last Friday.
Mr Lupari said it was his task as chief secretary to get Government departments and statutory bodies to work together to deliver services to Papua New Guineans and save costs.
Mr Lupari said previously there was no central leadership to ensure coordination and cooperation among departments.
“Sharing of resources makes it more cost effective. Under this MoA, Telikom towers can be used by NBC and vice versa,” he said.
The two CEOs signed the agreement to share satellites facilities which will be utilised for the telecast of National Television Service on Sept 16.
Mr Loko said one transmission tower costs about K145, 000.
Meanwhile, Mr Ealedona said NTS will operate under the Broadcast Act and managed by NBC.
He said it would not be a government propaganda tool.
He said as per the Broadcast Act, its editorial will be independent as is currently practised and policed at the NBC.

Ok Tedi miners return to work
OK TEDI mine workers who stayed away from work in protest against a salary increase returned to work last Saturday.
The workers returned to work after they had discussions with Ok Tedi Mining Ltd managing director Allan Breen last Friday.
“In a memorandum to employees, Mr Breen said that striking employees had agreed to an amicable return to work at the start of day shift on Saturday,” a press release from OTML yesterday read.
The matters discussed at the meeting were not disclosed by the management and attempts by The National to contact union executives to lean about what was discussed last Friday were unsuccessful.
The strike began last Tuesday and lasted four days, costing the mine about US$48 million (K134 million).
“The stoppage resulted in a loss of production of some 2,500 tonnes of copper concentrates and 200kg of gold,” OTML said in the statement.

PM keen to stamp out graft: Temu
DEPUTY Prime Minister and Minister for Lands and Mining, Dr Puka Temu yesterday defended Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare’s record of fighting corruption in Government.
Dr Temu said an example of Sir Michael’s commitment was his determination to see the Finance Department inquiry proceed despite attempts to derail it.
“Despite the efforts of those with vested interest to repeatedly stall this inquiry, the Prime Minister had remained steadfast in his resolve to seeing this probe reach its natural end,” Dr Temu said in a statement.
He was reacting to calls last week by Transparency International for the Prime Minister to come out publicly and report about alleged corrupt practices by senior public servants and ministers.
TI said it was concerned about the Prime Minister’s silence on these issues.
But Dr Temu said it was mischievous of Transparency International to call on the Prime Minister to speculate on corruption in PNG.
He also called on Transparency International to identify specific areas where actions can be taken to eliminate graft.
He said the time for merely talking and doing too little about this disease is over.

Labour will act on complaints: Tibu
THE Labour and Industrial Relations machinery will be invoked to look into the laying-off of workers by mobile phone company Digicel PNG Ltd.
David Tibu, Secretary for the Department of Labour and Industrial Relations, said last Friday that if there was enough evidence from complaints by the aggrieved workers, action will be taken against the company.
Mr Tibu said however, the issue regarding the 120 laid-off Digicel workers had not yet “officially reached my office”.
Mr Tibu said his officers would be likely to meet Digicel officials to hear its side of the story, and then take it from there.
He said a worst case scenario would mean the matter being taken to the extreme situation of having an arbitration tribunal deal with it.
He said he heard about the matter in the news media last Friday and had not formally received an anything in black and white.
The National understands that the matter has been documented and sent to the Labour and Industrial Relations.

K3,000 to scholarship winner
Finance Corporation Ltd (FinCorp) along with partner business houses gave away K3,000 through the ‘Empowering Women Scholarship’fund, which assists women in their studies.
Sonya Badia Luvi, the lucky winner is a second year student at the Pacific Adventist University.
She said this money will go a big way in helping her parents complete her K10,000 school fees for this year.
The money will be deposited into the schools account as part of Sonya’s school fees.
Marketing officer, Chonginan Maong said the company is doing so much in assisting children and young people in the payment of school fees.
“It’s a great thing to assist so many aspiring people and it’s good for the country in terms of the human resource development,” Mr Maong said.

Kids clash out of school
SCHOOLS in Lae have started the season for fights again.
Last Friday, students from the Huonville Primary School walked for more than 5 Kms past the administrative headquarters at Top Town and onto the St Pauls Lutheran Primary School.
Classes at the school beside the lake had been called off at lunch in preparation for Palm Sunday.
Crestfallen, the Huonville students reorganised at the busy Eriku shopping centre.
A fight erupted.
Police who were there to prevent pick-pockets and hawksters, intervened to stop the fight in front of the busy Papindo and Raumai 18 shops.
Children, no older than 10 years, were seen to be involved.

Church leader against false claim
By SENT TIMBI
A CHURCH leader has said that a K7 million claim against the State for locals’ properties and houses allegedly damaged by police last year at Hariba village in Southern Highlands province, is a false claim.
Ikija Tekebe, a church leader and community representative from Tagali local level government area in Tari district, said on Sept 11, last year, members of a gang, armed with two M16 rifles, raped a student at Hariba Primary School, slashed two pigs, damaged classrooms and an aid post and chased the locals away.
Mr Tekebe said he brought Tari police to the village to arrest the gang members but a gun battle ensued.
He said angry villagers reacted by destroying properties of the gangsters. “The destruction was not the work of police,” he added.
Mr Tekebe said those seeking K7 million should be arrested and charged by the police for submitting false claim.
He said people are tired of leaders trying to defraud the state and tough actions should be meted out to them.

Apprentices vaccuum felt
OVER one thousand new apprentices were lost to the Works Department when the Plant and Transport Board (PTB) was made redundant 10 years ago.
Works Secretary Joel Luma, at the revamping of the PTB in Lae last week, said that without the PTB, the training programmme of young mechanics, electricians and panel beaters was stopped.
“This had led to a void in a quality human resource and the Works Department had been unable to fulfill its obligation to provide a cheap, reliable and safe road network and keep the country abreast of global changes,” Mr Luma said.
“Over the 10 years the PTB had been idle we had lost 1,440 apprentices,” he said.
When the apprenticeship programme was run under the PTB, it was able to train an average of 108 apprentices every year, Mr Luma said.

New TV station to focus on local news: PM
LOCAL news content will be the thrust of the new TV station the Government will set up, Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare has said.
He said the National Television Service (NTS) would be a commercial station to focus on educating and informing Papua New Guineans in more detail of developments taking place around the country.
“At present, there is no quota of local content that the Government demands from the existing media organisations,” Sir Michael said.
“We believe our PNG audience wants to have more information about our own country, not just what is happening in Port Moresby and overseas,” he said in a statement.
Sir Michael said cabinet had endorsed K12 million as an initial funding for the NTS.
He said the only content-producing institution is the National Film Institute.

Japanese hold cultural show
THE Japanese embassy in Port Moresby staged a two-day annual cultural exhibition to showcase the country’s cultural products last week.
The embassy’s first secretary Naohito Izumikawa said he was pleased to see students attending the March 13-14 exhibition as it gave them an opportunity to decide if they should want to take up further studies in Japan later in their lives.
He said that over 3,000 Japanese tourists come to Papua New Guinea every year and Air Niugini has a direct flight to Tokyo every week which shows his people’s interest in this country and its people.
“Japan has an interest in PNG and wants to have a more open and friendly relationship with the people of PNG,” Mr Izumikawa said.
He said Japan had a distinguished culture and would like to share it with the rest of the world.
“We would like a more friendly relationship with the people of PNG and we, at the embassy, are willing to assist anyone with queries of Japan or in any other way in our capacity to help strengthen relationships,” Mr Izumikawa said.

Chiefs want long reach of law
By AUGUSTINE KINNA
THE chiefs and people of Konnou constituency in south Bougainville have challenged the Bougainville police to beef up their capacity to address the law and order issues in the area.
According to leading Konnou chief Steven Taisu, law and order issues are a big problem in the area which needs special attention by law enforcement bodies.
He said police were physically present in the area, but were not doing enough to help curb lawlessness in the area.
“South Bougainville, at the moment, is facing major hiccups with the rising murder cases, road blocks and arms possessions,” Mr Taisu said.
He told The National that the situation in Konnou was quite tense and chiefs and ex-combatants in the area are doing their very best to seek amicable solutions to the problems.
“We are still facing all sorts of problems in south Bougainville and police have been sitting and ignoring the realities,” Mr Taisu said.
He said police activities were centred in Buka where they were not doing anything but roaming around and wasting time while the real problems continued.
Mr Taisu suggested that police should increase the number of its officers and operations.

Suspect to stand trial over alleged murder
By PETER MIVA
THE Lae District Court has committed a 45- year-old Morobe man to stand trial over the alleged murder of a village councillor.
Asu Nasele from Wideru village, Bukawa, appeared before Lae committal magistrate Sasa Inkung, charged with one count of murder under Section 300 of the Criminal Code last Wednesday morning.
He was charged with the murder of a 55-year-old councillor Saking Kassam also from the same village last Jan 10 during an argument.
Court documents said that Nasele, who had a grudge against Kassam, was drunk at that time and approached the councillor.
It is alleged that Nasele called out to the victim to come out from his betel nut garden where he punched and kicked him several times.
The magistrate ordered Nasele to be remanded at Buimo jail to appear in the National Court on April 10 for a trial date to be set.

Rice farming hampered: Expert
THE potential of developing industrial farming in Papua New Guinea has been prevented by the country’s customary land ownership.
An Indonesian rice farming expert said this while conducting a seminar for agriculture officers and non-government organisations (NGO) in Madang last week.
Jatjat Ruchjat a Japanese Internaional Co-operation Agency (JICA) expert said the country has the potential of earning huge revenue from commercial rice farming.
However, customary land ownership practices have prevented this prospect from becoming a reality, he said.
He said from his observation in Madang, there are huge land areas that could be used for large scale commercial farming of rice.
Mr Ruchjat said apart from commercial rice farming, there is also the opportunity for the people to engage in small scaleproduction of farm rice.

Farmers urged to raise more food crops
By ELIAS LARI
FARMERS throughout the Western Highlands province (WHP) have been urged to grow more food crops for a Port Moresby chain of supermarkets.
A new company call edPNG Fresh is urging farmers to produce more for the National Capital District (NCD) market.
The two company directors Peter Aitsi and George Bopi disclosed this during an inaugural conference with the WHP farmers at Hotel Poroman in Mt Hagen last week.
Messrs Aitsi and Bopi told farmers they have arranged for a new market with the Stop ‘N’ Shop chains of supermarkets in Port Moresby where farmers can directly sell their produce.
Mr Bopi said many major supermarkets in the country do not buy fresh food from local producers instead import them.
He said farmers have to try producing quality vegetables as the market PNG Fresh has identified would cease imports and only order them from WHP.

New PNGCI president
THE PNG Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PNGCCI) has a new president. John Leahy was elected during the recent annual general meeting in Port Moresby.The vacancy in the position follows the decision by Michael Mayberry not to accept nomination for the role after having served as president since 1996. Mr Mayberry will remain as vice-president and will continue to be the chamber’s representative on a number of significant boards including, in particular, the Central Bank where he plays a key role. The PNGCCI is a peak body that represents the 13 chambers of commerce that operate throughout the country. The chamber is affiliated to the international chamber of commerce through its membership with the confederation of Asia Pacific chambers of commerce and industry.

Illegal miner actions stopped
THE National Government’s efforts to clamp down on illegal miner activities at the Porgera gold mine have been boosted with the donation of two new vehicles. Porgera Joint Venture Barrick has bought two new Toyota Troopers and handed them over to Mobile Squad (MS) police to assist themcarry out the illegal miner action programme effectively. MS18 of Tomaringa in East New Britain which is currently in Porgera received the vehicles during a handover ceremony on site last week. The vehicles cost the company more than K200,000.

Woman swept away by river
AN elderly woman from Menyamya was swept away by strong currents after she tried to cross the flooded Bulolo River near Misis Booth mining settlement in Wau, Morobe province, last Tuesday. The woman attempted to cross the flooded river with the assistance of her son when she was caught by the current. Her body was recovered the following day by six miners. Anna Ibsagi, an alluvial miner, saw the dead woman’s body washed onto the river bed.