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By FRANK ASAELI
VITAL services in the city were disrupted after disgruntled PNG Power
employees shut down power supply into the city.
The power shutdown disrupted communication and banking services, and
caused substantial losses to businesses in the city.
Power was restored late last night after a deal was struck (see separate
story on page 2), but not after the damage was done.
Business houses slammed the stop-work, saying it was deplorable that
they could hold the community and businesses to ransom.
“Many of our members have asked why the Government cannot move in
military or police personnel to protect vital assets,” Port Moresby
Chamber of Commerce and Industry president David Conn said yesterday.
He said the Tiare Gateway collapsed for some time, effectively cutting
PNG off from the world.
“We cannot operate this way and all parties need to realise that and be
reasonable and understand the consequences of their actions rather than
their own parochial concerns,” he said.
He said the lack of communication had brought business to a standstill.
As a result of the power blackout, Telikom’s Boroko and Ela Beach
telephone exchange collapsed.
Acting chief executive officer Peter Loko said this affected mobile
phone services yesterday as Telikom lost a large number of their mobile
base stations.
He said the switching of generators had caused some dropout of services.
ANZ Waigani branch was closed for business yesterday starting 8am due to
communication errors and will continue unless something is done to
restore communications.
Chief operations officer Arthur Hubert confirmed the closure of the
Waigani ANZ branch for the whole day resulting from disruptions to the
telephone exchange at Boroko mainly.
He said ANZ Waigani branch and ATMs will continue to be closed only if
communications are not in operation.
Director-general of corporate services at the Department of Foreign
Affairs John Balavu said the power outage disrupted their work, as they
lost data and had to start all over again.
Electronic banking manager for WestPac Limited Kevin Kasap confirmed
having problems with their EFTPOS and ATM machines yesterday morning but
got them into operation with back-up power from a generator.
“Our EFTPOS is okay; ATMs were down this (yesterday) morning but are now
powered by a back-up generator,” Mr Kasap said.
Dr Bhalachandra Keni, chief executive officer of the Pacific
International Hospital (PIH) said the blackout hit their CT scanner,
making it inoperable.
He said their standby generator was too costly and the loud noise hurt
the public and their patients.
Election officials had to rush in generators to ensure the blackout did
not disrupt counting in the three NCD counting centres.
 
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