Allow people to get loan for SME

THE Prime Minister James Marape and his coalition government should consider directing all commercial banks to open up their lending policies to allow Papua New Guineans to borrow money under government guarantee schemes.
This will assist SME to create employment opportunities.
We read and hear a lot about lack of support from the government on education and teachers’ issues, etc… but what about the topic of unemployment and population rise?
Yes, I do agree that education is important in our society and for nations building.
But will there be enough employment opportunities for our future generation?
We see thousands of primary, high school, colleges and universities graduating students year in, year out building up to an unemployment time bomb.
The Government needs to educate our people about the importance of employment after education and raising family units.
In other developed and developing nations, education, employment and population increase are seen as a single component and top government priorities.
I am concerned about the high rate of population growth in PNG and the unemployment problems today.
People are not careful with family planning.
They fail to tackle issues of women and teenage girls giving birth daily as a result of unprotected sex, prostitution and others.
In Great Britain, it takes K1 million to raise a child up to the age of 21 unlike in PNG.
Many Papua New Guineans spend money on educating their children to at least grade six, eight, ten and 12.
But there are not enough jobs available.
Therefore, children who finish schools end up at home or hang around in towns and cities looking for employment opportunities.
The rise of unemployed youths has contributed to law and order problems we face nationwide.
In countries such as Singapore and Malaysia, their government allow citizens to use their education qualification to borrow from commercial banks to start up small to medium enterprise (SMEs) businesses to help themselves create employment for others in moving their country’s development agenda forward.
I appeal to the government to direct commercial banks to open up that policy for our people to tap into.
The Government should not be afraid to make tough decisions.
People obtaining these loans should be allowed a maximum of 10 years to repay with reasonable interest rates.
They should be exempted from paying business taxes under the Government’s guarantee tax holiday of 10 years to allow the borrowers to repay back their loans then start paying taxes to the state.
In this way, PNG will tackle some of our education, employment and population problems and move forward in building this nation.

Samson Napo,
Former Bulolo MP