Summit to discuss wealth distribution

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National Planning and Monitoring Minister Richard Maru told Parliament that there will be a planning summit in January to discuss issues of wealth distribution to sub-national governments.
Responding to questions by Maprik MP John Simon about districts not receiving equal funding, Maru said the summit would be an opportunity to discuss and plan that.
“We are going to sit down and talk about the issues where we have the economic hubs’ key economic roads and factor that into a national plan and fund that over the next five years,” he said.
“Key towns like Maprik, which are service centres supporting four or five districts, should be given special emphasis in the plan.
“We intend to fix that and I’ll be looking forward to your contributions in the workshop that we are going to have. We need to be fairer to all the districts and the regions and the provinces and we will continue with the district service improvement programme (DSIP) and provincial SIP.”
Maru said the government would start building the economy for each province to be independent.
“We have to start building the economy of each province with  their strengths – we have to support them to build them to start being independent rather than depending on Waigani.
“That’s the shift we are going to see in the way we are going to do business in the next five years and fund that plan as we go forward.
“I look forward to meeting you all as we sit down and put together a plan for the next five years and fund that plan as we go forward.
Maru said those plans would all be revealed in the budget next week.
“One of the first programmes we are going to fund now is building hospitals in every single district of our country over the next five years,” he said.