By HARLYNE JOKU
THE Opposition in their 27-page 2008 Budget reply in Parliament yesterday posed the question as to how Papua New Guineans are going to be empowered sustainably by the Government’s K8.9 billion.
Deputy leader of the Opposition and spokesman for Treasury and Finance Bart Philemon, who gave the budget reply titled “Empowering People in a Resource Rich, Poor Papua New Guinea”, asserted that millions of kina of the budget was being parked in trust accounts and questionable projects in the budget.
Mr Philemon said post millennium budgets of billions of kina doubled every year, yet the key question was whether they had any impact in the lives of the people?
“We are a resource rich poor country. Why? This is a question we as leaders must ask,” he said.
He stressed that although the budget since Independence had grown, the social and development indicators did not show this dramatic rising and annual flush of the budget.
He said the 2008 Budget being the 32nd annually had grown from K408 million at Independence in 1975 to over billions in 2000.
Mr Philemon further claimed that K1.8 million development budget was insignificant as it meant the countries development was in the hands of donor partners.
“The very people we criticise shun and insults are developing Papua New Guinea and feeding the people we say are our people. We should be ashamed. Whether we like it or not we are a resource rich, poor country,” Mr Philemon said.
He said the Government was not managing petty cash but must spend money effectively as a tool to raise the living standards of Papua New Guineans progressively.
He added that the 2008 Budget did not offer Papua New Guineans assurance that it could be applied diligently in achieving such empowerment.
Mr Philemon said the K8.9 billion budget although the biggest since independence was set on a faulty structure.
“Like a rusty water tank in which the base has moved because of an earthquake and water leaking out at will, as long as we have a faulty base, no matter how big the resource envelope is, it will disappear without making any real changes,” he said.
He further questioned the Government’s policy on so called public-private partnership on State-owned assets and when Papua New Guineans were going to see the results.
Mr Philemon criticised the Government saying it had given little attention and focus on the microeconomic sector, for example it had not come back with set timeframes on infant mortality rates, reduce maternal mortality rates and deaths from curable diseases such as tuberculosis, malaria and pre-natal conditions among others.