Moroi challenges community leader

CENTRAL Governor Alphonse Moroi wants a Goilala community leader to report how he had used K36,000 given to him by Goilala MP Matthew Poya to carry out peace work in the district.
Mr Moroi said the same leader, who headed the Goilala Law and Order Task Force for the Law and Justice Secretariat supported by AusAID, had negotiated funding from the MP and used it in Port Moresby instead of restoring peace and normalcy in Goilala.
Mr Moroi was responding to recent news reports that quoted deputy chairman of the task force Sivi Komai criticising Mr Moroi’s “guns for cash” initiative as failing to solve the law and order issues in the district.
Mr Moroi said Mr Komai was a Port Moresby-based Goilala who has not lived in his district and experienced real changes.
“I have been informed that Mr Komai has in his possession a carbine (a high powered rifle) which his friends had stolen from a police roadblock at Laloki. The rifle belonged to a senior police officer.
“Mr Komai should order his ‘boys’ to surrender the carbine and other guns in their possession,” he said.
Mr Moroi said he had refused to give funding to Mr Komai for his work on law and order issues because he had not provided an acquittal report on how he had spent the K36,000.
Mr Moroi said Mr Komai should not be soliciting funds for his awareness work from politicians but from the secretariat and Government.
“I initiated the guns-surrender as per the Singirok Report recommendations. I have bought back a total of 13 guns and two hand grenades since launching the initiative during the 2006 Independence Day.”