O’Neill wants to see improvement on detention facility

 By MALUM NALU

PRIME Minister Peter O’Neill says management of the Australian-funded detention centre needs to be improved.

He was responding to Australian SBS’s Dateline programme on Tuesday, which reported allegations of rape, abuse and self-harm among asylum seekers on Manus.

O’Neill told the FM100 Talkback Show yesterday that such incidents happened when people from different cultures lived together.

He said PNG immigration was working very closely with their Australian counterparts in managing the processing centre.

“There are some issues about management of the refugee processing centre and I think the (Australian and PNG) governments will need to manage that better,” he said.

“Some of the contractors are not doing the job they are paid to do.

“They need to beef up their performance so that people staying there are as comfortable as possible.”

Commenting on last Friday’s riot by refugees in Nauru, and the possibility that it could happen in PNG, O’Neill said: “Our aim is to try and build a permanent facility that is going to reduce this kind of opportunistic behaviour by people who are trying to get attention in a very violent manner.

“It’s not going to do them any good.”