Central provincial candidates came together yesterday afternoon in a press conference to outline their grievances and put forward demands to the Central Province Election Manager, Peter Malaifeope. Hosting the press conference, PNC endorsed candidate Rufina Peter and other contesting candidates, Scott Morata and Paul Simon and others, came together in a united front to address the issue of the 36 missing ballot papers after the first exclusion. According to the candidates, the first candidate excluded this morning, Gabriel Lala scored 146 votes but after the distribution of the papers, 36 from the original 146 papers went missing, leading to the suspension of the Central Regional counting yesterday. A vocal Rufina Peter stated that this type of irregularities are serious and to her, is an indication that the counting process is compromised. “So 36 ballot papers went missing somewhere, and so the counting was stopped while scrutineers demanded that they find the 36 papers. As we speak now, the 36 papers have not been recouped,” Peter said. She added that they would like to see a few changes before the commencement of the exclusion process continues. They would like to see: 1. Total recount of the papers. 2. A change in the counting officials. 3. Should the prior not be taken up, livestreaming of the exclusion should suffice. She reiterated further on their second point, stating that they had established that most of the counting officials are public servants working under the current provincial administration and believes that due to that affiliation with the provincial administration office, they should not have been engaged as counting officials, as that would be a conflict of interest. “The team here and I, in terms of petition, want to see that the Provincial Returning officer and his assistant, and all of the current team that comprises largely of Central Provincial Administration staff, plus some of the staff from the current governor’s office removed,” Peter said. The candidates have all agreed that should they not receive a favorable response to the demands that they have set, they will advise their scrutineers to boycott the counting process.

Seem like the pre-election awareness campaign has paid off in the Southern Highlands province with no major election-related incidents resulting in violence. This is all thanks to the hard working Royal Papua New Guinean Constabulary Policemen & Women working in the province who made it their initiative to educate the people of on the processes of the elections, election violence and its possible outcomes. Provincial Police Commander for Southern Highlands Province, Chief Inspector Daniel Yangen has expressed great satisfaction with the way the elections have progressed so far. “I have been doing a lot of awareness in the province and we are talking to the people about reality and life, how to select candidates and the consequences of their actions. The candidates have also been very helpful, although there are a few that had grievances among themselves but generally there has been nothing disturbing,” he said. PPC Yangen remarked that the whole operation for the province has been one for advocating peace and harmony amongst the people. Meanwhile, when asked about the incident this morning, the Chief Inspector addressed the issue, stating that it was not a major incident, just a misunderstanding between the supporters and candidates and blamed social media for instilling panic in the community. “That was not a really big situation but due to social media, people are making it big news,” he said. The whole commotion started when the SHP regional candidates asked for a tally board in order for the public to see the figures reported in the counting room. Then certain open candidates misunderstood the action taken by the regional candidates and demanded that the Returning Officer declare the leading candidate as the winner, causing widespread confusion and commotion for the public. “The videos that went viral on social media, like many other places in the country were just a misinterpretation of what was really happening, Yangen said. So far so good, all is in order and everything has returned to normal. PPC Yangen believes that with the way they are going, they should return their writs before the end of the deadline.

The Moresby Arts Theatre on Tuesday, 3rd August 2022 initiated their Youth Arts Program [YAP] with students from Tokarara Secondary School and also students from the University of Goroka. According to Dr. Jane Awi, this is the 7th year to run a successful program. Dr. Awi is a lecturer at the UoG and she also currently occupies the role as executive director for the Somare Research Institute, of which she heads 7 of the institutes. Dr. Awi explained that the YAP is a 6 week program for high school students [NCD schools in particular] and through the program, they help students to portray a representation of social issues and highlight key community issues. To unpack issues which is then complimented with theatre training. Through this, Dr. Awi stated that the students are given the necessary tools to represent these issues. The first 2 weeks of sessions will be held at MAT and after that the students will return to their school for the next 4 weeks of project development. They were scheduled to start last week, but due to the unrest in the city, they moved their start date to this week. “Then on the 6th week, they will return to the theatre to stage their performance, so they will do a performance as a project and it will be for about 4-5mins,” she said. The best performance or the most outstanding student drama will win prizes. The program is a partnership between the Moresby Arts Theatre and the UoG since 2016 and this year is the 7th year of partnership between both bodies.

Family members and supporters of the Lakatois were out in full force yesterday afternoon to welcome home the OFC Women’s Nations Cup champions at the Jackson International airport this afternoon. With their flight touching down on the tarmac, one could see the excitement and anticipation on the faces of those that turned up to welcome home our local girls after a successful campaign of the pacific. Led out onto the tarmac by a jubilant Papua New Guinea Football Association President, Mr. John Kapi Nato, emotions ran high as the lasses that left the country almost 3 weeks ago with only their ambitions at heart, returned home with that dream signed, sealed and delivered in the OFC Women’s Nations cup Trophy. Present at the airport to receive them, PNGFA Executives and the General Secretary, Mr. Paius Letenge thanked all the family, friends and supporters that turned out last night to welcome back the brave women, commenting that it was keystone achievement for the ladies and the country as a whole. “This is something special for football especially and we hope that moving on from today, we can contribute together and develop the code in the country,” the General Secretary remarked. He also highlighted that yesterday marked a new era of football in the country and a new chapter has been written and that there is still more to be written. Mr. Letenge congratulated and welcomed the Lakatois home and urged them to savour the moment, as they had deserved it . “Go out, celebrate and absorb everything you need to absorb, but please do also share the experience that you gained in the tournament,” Letenge urged the girls. The Lakatois are the only team that was undefeated in the tournament.

The Western Highlands Provincial Police Commander, Superintendent John Sagom has called on communities in the province to respect the counting process and the outcome of the elections in the province. With all that has happened in the past week, Supt. Sagom has stated all in all, the province has been peaceful, but is expecting anything to happen. “Everyone will have to respect the outcome. There is no need to fight amongst yourselves, these things should not be happening, and at all costs we are appealing to the people to not take up arms,” the superintendent said. As a precautionary measure, roadblocks have been set up in the Western Highlands Province to ensure the safety of the people. According to the Provincial Police Commander, Superintendent John Sagom, police have set up roadblocks at the entrances into Western Highlands and various parts of the province. Roadblocks have been put up on the highlands highway coming into the town from the Kagamuga Airport. They are also doing thorough security checks to make sure that there are no such weapons as bush knives entering the province. He said they are monitoring the movement of all persons travelling in and out of the province.

Friday afternoon (29/07/22) at the VIP Terminal at the Jacksons Airport here in the nation’s capital, Interim Prime Minister, James Marape, joined by Hela Governor elect, Phillip Undialu and Kavieng Open member-elect, Ian ling Stuckey to welcome back Bougainville Provincial member, Peter Tsiamalili Jnr to the floor of parliament and also newly elected governor for East New Britain, Michael Marum. Both members of parliament were welcomed into the loving arms of an exited Marape, who expressed great satisfaction. “On behalf of our team here I would like to convey our sincerest congratulations to both members of parliament,” Marape said. He further added that a new generation of leaders are now emerging to be part of the fold, to ensure we carry on the story on fighting for the people’s rights. Marape highlighted the significance of the return of Bougainville Provincial member elect, Peter Tsiamalili Jnr to the floor of parliament. Mr. Marape stated that they have major tasks to address the Bougainville issues, reiterating that stability and continuity or consistency of focus. “I just want to congratulate him [Tsiamalili Jnr] his family and his wife is here, his supporters and the people of Bougainville, including President Ishmael Toroama and the Bougainvillian govt. for their confidence in the regional member re-elected,” He said. Marape also added that he has been an integral part of their work in the last 2 years since he was first elected into the floor and for him to come back, he just wanted to take the opportunity to appreciate the work that Tsiamalili has done. Apart from that, he has urged that his Party is ready to make Papua New Guinea progress further in terms of strategic and economic growth. “We just want to get on and continue what we do,” Marape said. Reinforcing his statement, he added that it was Pangu that gained independence for the country, in this generation of Pangu, they want to take a step further. “We promised better education, better infrastructure, better health and a better economy, leaving no one behind. Everyone must grow together,” he said.

The last electorate from Central Province to start the counting for their electorate, the Goilala counting have taken that challenge head on and in after just 2 days of counting, their team are ready to proceed to the exclusion process. In total, 84 ballot boxes, 42 each for the provincial and the open seat were breezed through by the counting officials. According to the Goilala Open Assistant Returning Officer, Mr. Kisito Samuel, it was not without issues but they have successfully pulled through and today moved on to the quality check for the open seat boxes. Today they have proceeded to the exclusions. Just like other centres in the country facing petitions, the Goilala counting officials are no exception. Yesterday candidates contesting the seat petitioned Mr. Maia, demanding that he replace the counting officials with persons neutral to the electorate. A distressed Mr. Maia then addressed the candidates and supporters, advising them procedures of the counting process and that these sort of demands are unreasonable. “Both my ARO and I addressed the candidates and their supporters and I’m glad they are now satisfied. We can now get back to conducting the quality checks,” he said. He also advised that should the candidates still have grievances, there are other avenues that they can seek out. All in all, the Mr. Maia is optimistic that they will be able to declare a candidate for the electorate on Monday.

East New Britain Governor elect, Michael Marum, yesterday afternoon was welcomed back to the capital for the first time as an elected politician. Both himself and Bougainville Provincial member-elect, Peter Tsiamalili Jnr were welcomed by Interim Prime Minister, James Marape, Kavieng Open member elect, Ian Ling Stuckey and Hela Governor-elect, Phillip Undialu. After greeting with the Pangu heads, a press conference was held at the VIP terminal at the Jacksons International Airport. Being the only independent candidate amongst the Pangu elite, Governor-elect Marum was given the opportunity to speak first at the press conference. Governor-elect Marum, addressing the media for the first time as a politician, stated that he was privileged to be here in the nation’s capital representing the people of East New Britain and thanked the Pangu leader for inviting him. “On behalf of the people back at home, I would like to thank you [Marape] for inviting me to be part of this conference,” the Governor-elect said. He also strongly maintained that he was still an independent member and thanked the Pangu constituents for their unwavering understanding. He added that he was happy and excited to be part of the team of members that he was with. Marum stated that he had had other conversations with other members of different parties, but due to his personal association with the prime minister and his family, that relationship inspired him to associate with Pangu. He will be meeting with various members of parliament before he heads back home to East New Britain.

Official declarations for the Moresby South sitting Member Justin Tkatchenko has been delayed as the quality checks have just begun. But not without a little drama, because as quickly as they started with the first box, everything then went south this afternoon with scrutineers raising issues about the unused ballot papers. Although the ballot papers have been stored away, as they are considered dead papers, scrutineers again asked to see them, so they can see if they complement those that are live and in the boxes. Returning Officer for Moresby South Mr Tau Toea responded stating that that is not part of the process and should he include them in the same room as the live ballot papers, that would jeopardise the entire counting process. The scrutineers argued that should they not be able to produce the ballot papers, then at least produce the serial numbers. The quality check came to a slight halt for some time, as they had to bring in the security personnel to assist with the issue. With advice from the venue commander, they have now resumed the checks. Meanwhile, at the same venue, the Rita Flynn Counting centre; counting for the NCD regional seat has also been suspended due to alleged errors with the tally. CID are on site conducting investigations.

Counting for the Moresby South Electorate has been suspended for an indefinite period pending advice from Election Manager, Mr. Kila Ralai. Returning officer for Moresby South, Mr. Tau Toea, has advised that due to the security risk that was posed on Sunday outside the Vision City Mega Mall over the weekend, counting was suspended at 2am on Monday morning. “Due to the security risk posed by the attack on Sunday, upon consultation with the Election Manager, I have decided to suspend counting indefinitely, pending advice from the Election Manager." He also advised that the decision that he made was also for the scrutineers, who had been walking home late. The RO has divulged that many of his counting officials have been threatened by a number of scrutineers. Mr. Toea added that it was also one of the reasons why counting had to be suspended. “For a few days now, certain scrutineers have been threatening our counting officials saying that they would attack the counting centre." Toea added that there was a situation at the counting venue this morning, but he has further stated he is unsure of the specifics of what had transpired.

"The commotion in the Nation's Capital this morning was not as bad as it was portrayed on social media." That's from NCD Metropolitan Superintendent Gideon Ikumu at a media conference today in Port Moresby. Ikumu said that the situation was manageable but due to social media, everything was blown out of proportion. "Rumors of a number of people dying are also false." The NCD Police Boss further advised that the violence that was seen again in the Nation’s capital is a blowback of the incident from yesterday. He said there have been ongoing issues like these and they were being handled by the Electoral Commission. Accompanied by both the Media Office of the Police Commissioner’s Office, Superintendent Dominic Kakas, and Superintendent David Terry from the Divisional Commanders Media Office, Ikumu did not waste time but dove right into retelling events that transpired. “We are all here for what had happened yesterday and as a result, escalated to the events that we experienced this morning." "The incident that happened yesterday was because of a couple of boxes that were disputed, especially around the Ward 6 area on Saturday." He added that there were issues that the Electoral Commission was dealing, with; one of them was the dispute of the boxes from ward 6 and amongst the scrutineers, there was a disagreement. "They took the tussle outside and were arguing which most likely turned ugly." He stated that with the counting going on, you will notice that people were camping around the counting centers, and some managed to conceal weapons under their camping equipment. “Somehow they were able to conceal weapons like knives, stones, and little projectiles that were used in the fighting." A few people have sustained injuries and two men had major injuries but they were not mortal wounds and there were no fatalities. Superintendent Ikumu informed that the CID are now conducting their investigation into the matter. “Right now the CID is investigating and trying to establish the cause of the events so that we can determine which of the two sides instigated the incident."

Counting for the Moresby North-West Electorate, had to be suspended Wednesday night, after an irate number of candidates fronted up at the PILAG gate in Waigani, to hand a supplementary petition to the MNW Returning Officer and demanding the PNG Electoral Commissioner address them and respond to the demands of the petition by 8am today. Candidate Mr. Isaac Lupari, speaking on behalf of the 12 candidates that were present last night, told the MNW Returning Officer Mr. Vincent Manukayasi that a copy of the petition had been sent to the PNG Electoral Commissioner, the Police Commissioner, NCD Metropolitan Superintendent, Venue Commander, State Solicitor and the NCD Election Manager. “We demand that there be a live stream and we are disappointed that we have been made to run around by the EC and I think there is double standards being practiced,” Lupari said, stating the first demand of the petition. “If there is live streaming in Hela, why can’t we have it in the Nation’s Capital of PNG. Technology is here and we even offered to pay for the cost. We don’t know what is happening in there so as the people don’t know what is happening in there.” The MNW Candidates also demanded an immediate cease to counting as of last night and for there to be a recheck of ballot papers from Ward 1 that was completed yesterday afternoon. “We want a recheck to check whether the ballot papers have the PO’s signature there, whether the number is right, whether it corresponds to the journals of the presiding officers. We want that to be done transparently in the presence of all of our POs who were literally on the ground overseeing everything there and in front of our scrutineers.” The petitioning candidates also demanded their presiding officers be present for verification as and when boxes come out. “Number three, we want a neutral person to be assigned to oversee the operation of the CCTV.” The candidates further called for all the current counting officials to be removed and for there to be a mix of persons from different ethnic groups, to be part of the counting team, instead of having all officials from one only ethnic group. “There are conflicts of interest here. We want the ARO to be totally removed and replace with new and neutral people. All four disputed boxes must be set aside and must never be counted. They are tempered with, we have witnesses there, our scrutineers have seen it and even the POs have seen it being tempered with.” Isaac Lupari said the Returning Officer has the ultimate authority to set aside and not count all four disputed ballot boxes. He said to even consider counting these disputed ballot boxes would deny the candidates and the people to fairness in the process of counting. “We have given the Electoral Commissioner until 8 am today, to respond to all of us. If he doesn’t respond, we will seek legal action and while we are waiting for a response, we want the counting to be suspended until we are satisfied with a response from the PNG Electoral Commissioner.”