Lower paid citizens feeling the pinch

 I SUPPORT the article titled, “Housing cost too high” by PH Minaka. 

Today, you will hardly find a house for rent per fortnight anywhere in Port Moresby’s suburbs or in the settlements and all are going for rent per week which is simply killing us the lowly paid workers when the prices of other goods and services is also very high. 

Compared to Lae and other centres, it may differ a little as the living cost is quite low. 

For instance, in Lae you may have the chance to rent a full three bed room semi-permanent house in the city’s outskirts like Kamkumu, Nawae  or Bumbu for K500 per fortnight. 

Whereas in Port Moresby, you can no longer rent a full house for that price in settlements like Morata, 9-Mile or anywhere. 

You can only rent a small tiny room fitting only two people or less for that price. And most landlords today prefer leasing their rooms than the whole house especially in settlements due to the market demand which is very high. 

This is the reality we are facing today in Port Moresby whilst the government and the opposition are not doing anything to contain this problem maybe because many of our MPs have properties and are benefiting from this unregulated business which is the cause of all high rents. 

Moreover, whilst the rent prices is sky rocketing every month, most of our lowly paid folks are still on 20 toea and 30 toea pay increment yearly and how can they survive in a challenging environment like this and cope up with all these uncontrollable changes? 

Yet we hear the government boasting about reducing poverty and achieving its Vision 2050 with its so-called NID programme which cost millions whilst we the people in Port Moresby where the parliament is located are still crunching our teeth and feeling the pain of high rental prices with no one willing to hear our plea. 

The government has itself to blame for high crime level, prostitution and the rising number of these street kids because it has failed the people for a long time now to regulate the real estate industry.

37 Seiwok

Port Moresby