PM: Vice-ministers will be appointed

By HELEN TARAWA
THE Government will appoint vice-ministers who will be given key organisations to manage, Prime Minister James Marape says.
Marape told a press conference soon after the swearing in of his Cabinet ministers on Friday that a vice-ministers’ council would be established.
He said another key area is the governors’ council which would look at key issues, including budget and policy consultation, which would be filtered through this council.
“We are in the business of restructuring and reshaping our country, the way of doing government business gets better for everyone and the entire county can receive better services and those who will serve after us,” the prime minister said.
“Let me thank our predecessors. They have served in their time and space under circumstances they were operating under.
“We are not here to pass vindictive judgement of leadership of past and first amongst them I wish to pass my homage to the former Prime Minister Peter O’Neill,” he said.
Marape said O’Neill had every arsenal to defend his seat but he heard the people’s cry and stepped down.
“This partnership we have on the table will embrace all the positives that have come out in the seven years’ refining this and also come up with our own tailor-made mix of policies in the space of economy, the way we want to restructure government and hopefully the end result will be when our time is up as your leaders we will leave behind a better country to the next generation of leaders.
“That is what why we all want to take back PNG, make PNG the richest black Christian nation and I apologise to no one because well before anyone else arrived in this country, there were men like me.
“I will leave behind a better country, men like me after my time.
“I have a regional balance here, I see behind men of great expertise, youth and energy.
“Together we can harness talent to make our country what it must be as God had intended it to be.”