Winners and losers

IN my letter in June, I predicted that 60 per cent of the members of parliament will lose their seats in the 2017 national election.
I also said that some big-time MPs will be gone after the votes have been counted.
Now that the dust has settled, we can start counting the casualties.
While the Southern Highlands provincial is yet to be declared and Kundiawa-Gembogl open is subjected to a court injunction, 40.9 per cent of the 111 members of parliament have retained their seats while 59.1 per cent  have lost theirs, apart from the longest-serving member resigning this year from active politics.
Out of the 56 new MPs, 49 are new to the scene. Of the 56, four were re-elected after holding public office for less than two years before the 2017 national election.  The new MPs include 15 who had lost their seats, waited for five to 17 years before being voted back into parliament this year’ one retired veteran politician returned to active duty after he has been missing in action for five years.  Unfortunately, we were unable to retain or vote into parliament a woman.
In the meantime, the clock has started ticking as we start the countdown to the next election.  The MPs shall now let their work do the talking.

Tom Pringel
Port Moresby