People call on PM to release DSIP funds

 Morobe community leaders have issued a challenge to Prime Minister Peter O’Neill and Morobe Governor Kelly Naru over the delay in releasing their 2013 District Services Improvement Funds (DSIP) to Bulolo and Huon Gulf districts.

They said if the two were true people’s leaders then they should care more about them.

The two Morobe districts were given only K3 million each out of their allocated K10m DSIP funds from last year because their MPs were in the opposition along with four others.

The leaders, led by Kay Takising said yesterday in Lae that Bulolo and Huon Gulf contained some of the most vital national government projects like the Nadzab airport, Lae tidal basin project, Hidden Valley gold mine, the four-lane superhighway and the Wafi-Golpu mining project.

“Our challenge to O’Neill is to be a true people’s prime minister like Sir Michael Somare, who suffered heavy criticism from Basil at political level but still allowed Bulolo’s DSIP to be released in full when he was the PM,” Takising said.

“The level of criticism against the O’Neill-led government by the opposition is not as hard as the criticism Somare received from Basil, but Somare did what was right and that is where O’Neill has failed,” he said.

Naru has written to O’Neill and Finance Minister James Marape asking them to release the remaining K7 million to the districts.