Sir Salamo summons secretaries

By HELEN TARAWA
THE secretaries of the Finance and Treasury Departments have been summoned to appear before the Commission of Inquiry (COI) into the Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) loan deal.
Commission chairman Sir Salamo Injia issued the direction at an inquiry hearing yesterday after learning that Finance Secretary Dr Ken Ngangan and Treasury Secretary Dairi Vele were responsible for the authority to pre-commit funding of about K18million (A$5.5mil) for the contract of overseas solicitors.
Sir Salamo ordered both men to appear before the inquiry tomorrow, Wednesday March 11, to explain why there was a delay in issuing the funding.
The proceedings yesterday was to check compliance with direction issued for officers to attend to formalisation of contact to engage overseas solicitors.
“If they do not appear after the direction is given to them, the commission will be considering dealing with them for contempt of the commission.
“The commission is running out of patience with this whole process and it will not hesitate to deal with contempt under the COI Act if they fail to appear.”
State Solicitor Daniel Rolpagarea told the commission the contract for the overseas solicitors had been prepared but was awaiting funding.
Sir Salamo said: “It seems we are going around in circles in terms of getting the (funding) out.”