K300m saved: Official

MORE than K300 million in State funds was saved because of the Ombudsman Commission (OC), a senior official says.
Acting chief ombudsman Richard Pagen said this came about after the OC issued a special direction under section 27 (4) of the Constitution to temporarily halt the use of public funds during the 2017 National Elections. This was contained in the Ombudsman Commission 2016 and 2017 annual reports he presented recently.
Pagen said before the commission issued the direction, there were millions of kina in the district services improvement programme (DSIP) and provincial services improvement programme (PSIP) government accounts.
Pagen said by the time the direction was issued, only K500 million was left from which K200 million was used which left the K300 million after the election.
“I urge members of parliament to use these funds to bring necessary services to the people and not wait until the election period which could be seen as a way of luring voters,” he said.
Other notable achievements include a wide range court proceedings which the commission dealt with successfully including the filing of three special references under section 19 of the Constitution.
These include questions on the suspension of a leader, and the delay in the return of writs until all seats are declared.
Pagen said the OC also encountered a number of challenges especially in recruitment of officers to fill in the various vacancies.
“We are competing with the private sector to attract the best officers and obviously we are always at the losing end as the private sector pays better than the government.”
He said another challenge was the relocation of the OC office from the Tower in downtown Port Moresby to Petromin Haus at 3-Mile. He said this was one of the factors that had affected the production of the two annual reports.
Pagen said despite the challenges the commission had managed to achieve most of the activities it had planned for over the two years.