Remote villages need basic services, says youth leader

HAIA village in Chimbu’s Salt Nomane-Karimui lacks basic services like health, education and airstrip for human development, says youth leader Wetty Paul.
Paul, 23, said they were more than 5,000 people living in Haia, made up of six communities and they share the border with Kikori in Gulf.
They have had no access to quality education and the health services.
“We live inside the remotest part and health officials and the teachers find it difficult to serve the patient and the students because of no road network,” he said.
Paul said they had been living in isolation since independence and were in dire need of accessing basic services like other Papua New Guineans.
He urged the Salt Nomane-Karamui MP and Kikori MP to consider their daily struggles.
Paul said they had the labour force available to welcome any services.
He said Haia Primary School and health centre had been closed since last year and would open in June as usual for the enrolment and operation.
He said they usually go to Goroka, Kerema, Kundiawa or Mendi on a chartered flight or would walk along a bush track that would take four or five days and back.