School unhindered by election

Ogeranang Primary School in Finschhafen’s Burum local level government area is still functioning normally despite confusions brought about by General Election 2022, an official says.
District education manager Simon Shong was responding to questions from The National with regards to the school’s head teacher’s appointment as returning officer for Finschhafen.
“As far as I know, Kawage Mesere has been performing his duties and the school has been in operation this whole time,” Shong said.
“His appointment as RO however is news to me.”
Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai on June 9 revoked Esia Batu’s appointment as RO for Finschhafen and replaced him with Mesere.
“This decision has not disrupted the school’s learning but it is still very important that EC gives prior notice when involving our teachers for election duties,” he said.
Morobe programme adviser Keith Tangui said teachers’ appointments by Electoral Commission was legal and should not be questioned or criticised by the public.
“We should work with them to ensure a better GE22 turnout rather than criticising them,” he said.
Ogeranang Primary, with 300 students and 14 teaching staff, was recognised to be elevated to a junior high status.
Teachers, however, said that a classroom building project to accommodate this increase had stalled.
They noted that the deputy head teacher had not been in school for a while due to personal reasons but confirmed the school had been operating with no issues.

Morobe to distribute 850 ballot boxes

MOROBE provincial election manager Simon Soheke says 850 ballot boxes will be used with 425 teams for polling in Morobe’s 10 districts starting Monday.
Soheke said there would be a ballot box for open and regional seat allocated to each team.
“Each team will have two ballot boxes; one for regional and one for open seat,” he said.
Soheke said other election materials for the province have arrived.
“We are really late in terms of funding. But our materials have all arrived. If there are issues with materials shortfalls, returning officers would purchase those.
“We’re now doing inventory and quality checks to finalise them for distribution.
“This is to make sure that materials are alright, and electoral rolls are okay before dispatching to districts,” Soheke said.
He said non-sensitive election materials like ballot boxes, voting compartments and stationery were distributed to districts closer to Lae, starting yesterday afternoon.
“They’ll pick up sensitive materials like ballot papers, electoral roll, candidate posters, indelible ink, seals, and presiding officers journal after two days.
“We’ve received some money to help in dispatching materials to districts, and conduct polling officials training.”
He also said this was a national event and a lot of public servants would be involved in polling and counting.

Morobe gets funding to distribute election materials to districts

MOROBE election office has received K3 million for the distribution of materials to polling areas, says provincial election manager Simon Soheke.
The K3 million would cater for polling as well as counting.
Soheke said basic materials needed for the polling and counting had arrived already.
In terms of temporary election workers allowances, Soheke said that some of them had received their allowances.
“There are some that haven’t received theirs yet.
“Maybe because they are using third party accounts or their accounts are dormant.
We’ll try to help them,” he said.
Soheke said for those without bank accounts and lived in remote areas they would receive their allowances through local level government (LLG) coordinators.
“The money will not be given in cash because of past experiences where people’s monies were misused.
“Those without bank accounts, their allowances have been paid into the election office’s subsidiary account where the money would be transferred to the LLG coordinator to pay the workers in remote areas in cash.
“Most of them are in the areas where they would have to spend money to get to town to open a bank account.
“So to make it easier for them, they would receive the allowances through LLG coordinators,” Soheke said .
He said there would still be issues with people without bank accounts but they would find ways to help them.