With a total number of 6 seats still vacant in Parliament, Member for Finschhafen Rainbo Paita called on the government to give an update and when funding would be made available for the Local Level Government By-Elections to take place. “We live in a country with many challenges, and these are unprecedented times and it will continue to do so ahead,” said Paita. He said, in an event when disaster strikes, the first person to stand and support its people are the mandated leaders, but at this time, there are currently a couple of seats that are still vacant, and the by-elections has not happened yet. He said, when a seat is free, the people from that area don’t have a voice to air out their concerns on the floor of parliament. In response, Prime Minister James Marape said, there are 6 seats that are still vacant and a few of these seats are still attached to court cases and some of which are due to the passing of the members. But he reaffirmed to the house that, they will get the by-elections done once they retire Maprik Open (East Sepik) and Sohe (Oro) will move too 2 of the vacant seats. “The reason why they were a little bit late in calling for the by-elections was because, those seats were lost by the death of former members and out of customary obligations, we have to allow for the natural time for recovery to take place." “But the Pogera-Paiela seat (Enga) and the Dei seat if it is free of the court case, it will be in line for the by-elections at the very earliest.” Marape further stated that, the Dei seat, Madang seat and the Kabwum seat are vacant at this time due to court cases running against them. “Once the 2 by-elections for Maprik and Sohe is totally retired, we will hold by-elections for the other seats that are vacant.”