OC asked to act on report

THE Opposition has called on the Government to use the report on the K3 billion Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) loan compiled by the Ombudsman Commission (OC) instead of having another inquiry.
Opposition leader Belden Namah said the report by the OC was already tabled in Parliament and the Government needed to act on it.
“Why do we have to waste money and time again to investigate the matter?” he said.
“It has already been investigated and the findings and recommendations have been compiled by the OC,” he said. Namah said it was “unnecessary spending” of tax payers money.
He also called on the OC to act on their report and start making arrests.
“This Commission of Inquiry (COI) seems to be a delay tactic that is being used and will cost millions to conduct.”
Namah said if Prime Minister James Marape was serious about his goal of making Papua New Guinea “the richest black Christian nation” then he needed to practice cost cutting measures.
COI chairman Sir Salamo Injia in an earlier report said the inquiry would cost around K4 million.
Sir Salamo said the inquiry’s objective was to establish facts surrounding the decision by the previous government to obtain a loan of K3 billion, to seek an offshore loan and to select the Union Bank of Switzerland as the financier.
Sir Salamo said that the ultimate objective was to establish whether there were breaches in the country’s laws in the process of negotiation and approval of the UBS loan and whether persons involved in the deal could be held accountable for their negligence.
The COI was to start on Sept 17.
Meanwhile, the Opposition, on Monday, filed to go ahead with a court reference by former Opposition leader Patrick Pruaitch questioning the legality of Marape’s election with a substitute in the name of the referral.
Namah said the Opposition had formally written to continue pursuing the case.
He said Young and Williams lawyers filed to have the trial continue and applied to change the name of the referral from Pruaitch to his name as the official name in the referral.