Parents claim police brutality

 PARENTS of four young men at the Navunaram ward, in Gazelle district, East New Britain, are upset over alleged police brutality.

Parents expressed their concern on Friday in Kokopo over assault of their children last Tuesday at 4am.

They called on the provincial police commander Anthony Wagambie jnr to investigate the matter.

Benson Paparai, the father of a victim who received cuts to his forehead and at the back of his head, claimed his son was innocent.

This incident followed an unresolved matter which happened recently at the Navunaram ward.

Paparai, the chairman of Kaoro Agri Business Group, said the incident happened after retaliation. 

The victims were youths involved in a productive partnership in agriculture project (PPAP) by the Cocoa Board of Papua New Guinea and the Kaoro Agri Business Group (KABG).

Paparai said a group of men in the same ward had recently wrecked the project’s nursery training house and office and other resources belonging to the project.

He said he reported the incident to the Rabaul Police Station the same day but while in Rabaul, retaliation took place at the village between youths engaged in the project and another party.

Paparai claimed that in the early hours of Tuesday, a police vehicle with four armed and drunk policemen from Kerevat Police Station arrived and with the assistance of the other party, broke into one of the farmer’s house and pointed a gun at his face. His wife was next to him.

The farmer said he was shocked when he woke up to a gun pointing at him.

He said when he walked out of their family room, he received a blow to his mouth which left a cut on his lip.

The four youths, aged 17, 18, 20 and 21 were all assaulted as well. They alleged that police and men from the other party assaulted them and took personal properties.

One of the boys was a Grade 10 student of Malaguna Technical Secondary School.

Paparai said the victims, although being part of the KABG, were all innocent as other members of the group retaliated, not them.

Wagambie said he would act after an official complaint was lodged.