Paraka unfazed by arrest, fraud charges

 LAWYER Paul Paraka says he has nothing to hide and his conscience is clear following his arrest yesterday by the Taskforce Sweep team.

He said he would protect his reputation and integrity in court.

He was taken to the National Fraud and Anticorruption office in Port Moresby where he addressed reporters before he was taken in for a five-hour interview.

He described his arrest as “politically motivated” and said there was nothing sinister about the payments his law firm received from the State.

“Ironically, we are the very law firm that saved the State more than K3 billion from bogus and dubious claims made against it in the recent past.

“Unfortunately, politics in PNG has its own way of creating allies and it is regrettably sad to kill our own PNG businesses due to pure jealousy and discontentment by certain persons with ulterior personal motives.

Paraka denied reports that he had been evading police arrest. 

He said he only wanted to stall police investigations to defer his arrest to give time to the courts to determine the substantive proceedings he had filed.