US$79mil wasted on PMIZ: Exec

By DALE LUMA
AROUND US$79 million (about K276.9 million) was wasted on the Pacific Marine Industrial Zone (PMIZ) with nothing to show for on the project site in Madang, National Fisheries Authority (NFA) acting managing director Justin Ilakini says.
Ilakini told The National yesterday that the NFA was now going back to the drawing board to make sure that the project was done correctly with Government approving K100 million for the project in its 2022 budget.
He said work was underway to have a project steering committee comprising of officers from relevant departments with the department of National Planning and Monitoring and the NFA co-chairing the project team.
“Government transferred the PMIZ project to the NFA,” he said.
“In the last budget they approved K100 million for the project.
“We have, more or less, gone back to the drawing board to make sure that everything is done properly,” he said. “This is a project that doesn’t have a good name to it because of the amount of money that has been wasted on it with nothing to show for on the project site.
“What we are doing now is we want to make sure that every study that needs to be done is done.”
Ilakini said the NFA would ensure that there were development partners on hand to help develop the project. “It’s a really big project and the Government strongly feels that it’s a good project that will create more than 30,000 jobs for the people.
“It will provide the opportunity for investors to come and set up maybe more than 10 tuna processing plants and other spinoff benefits for the local people.”
Ilakini said land had been bought off by the government.