East Sepik Governor Allan Bird wants the government to make it known to parliament in the future just exactly how much the state owes in arrears for utilities and rentals to service providers.
Governor Bird, when giving his response to the 2023 Mid- Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook (MYEFO) update presented by the Treasurer recently in parliament, said the disclosure of such information for consideration for future government expenses in budgets, is important.
“I’m not sure how far back a lot of these arrears have been carried by the government, whether these things have happened over the last couple of years or these things go back a decade,” said Governor Bird.
“So, it would be nice to be informed and also if the house (Parliament) could be informed on the extent of the arrears of government.”
That way when doing future budgets, everyone can be aware of the debts outstanding that have incurred by various governments in the past and its incumbent on the current government to resolve them.
Governor Bird’s remarks in his response comes at a time when the government has a lot of outstandings owed to service provides, with the very recent matter with the Nambawan Super Limited (NSL) where the State owes the superfund over millions of Kina in rentals of its properties.
This matter is being currently resolved with the government team and the team from NSL working together to come up with a better solution to the State making payments to the superfund for outstanding rentals.