By JAMES KILA
EASTERN Highlands Governor Malcolm Kela-Smith has hit out at public servants, accusing them of being responsible for much of public money being misspent each year.
He said public servants in PNG treated public money as their own.
The governor said this in an address to the 9th Annual Pacific Parliamentary Dialogue in Goroka yesterday.
Mr Smith said that when he was on the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee, they discovered that about K2 billion was misused every year with the help of public servants.
“Indeed, as we speak, the Treasury printing process will be running hot issuing cheques from unspent budget funds,” he said.
Mr Smith said that last December alone, the Bank of South Pacific pointed out to him that K300 million of new deposits was public money.
He said the PAC had referred over 200 senior public servants to the Ombudsman Commission but no action had been taken.
He said he hoped the conference would consider how public servants could be controlled so that budgeted funds actually go towards social development, which in turn would create jobs and hence lower the incidence of idle people looking for some amusement or conflict.
Meanwhile, the governor has called for a review of the Westminster system of government applied by PNG in order to accommodate Melanesian values.
Mr Smith said he believed the Westminster system relied on the goodwill of men and must be refined to ensure fair representation the population.
“In PNG, we have about 818 languages and only 109 Members of Parliament. That meant 700 PNG ‘nations’ missed out on being represented in Parliament. It is like saying to Europe to have a Parliament but sorry England, France and Germany, you miss out. Do you think those nations are just going to sit there and say okay, we will wait for the next elections? No way and PNG is no exception,” Mr Smith said.
He said the Westminster system in PNG would eventually work – probably with the next two generations, provided education standards in remote areas of the country is improved.
The dialogue, which has parliamentary representatives from Australia, New Zealand, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga and Timor Leste, aims to explore ways Parliament can address contentious issues in conflict-affected societies and thereby strengthen and enhance the political governance of countries in the region.