The NCD/Central Division Commander, Assistant Commissioner of Police Anthony Wagambie Jnr has called for calm in the capital following the rampage and unsolicited attacks on the public and police personnel on earlier this week, which left many in the capital traumatized. The ACP when addressing the media recently, he stated that everyone in the capital city has the right to feel safe and move around freely without having to fear for their lives and called on everyone to respect each other. “This is the capital city of Papua New Guinea; it does not belong to any one group of people.” “There are a lot of people that move around here whether it would work or for studies they are all here.” “The city must stay safe for business to continue as usual.” He called for collaboration with the aggrieved relatives of the young man that was found dead around the Gordons area, calling them to come forward and assist should they have evidence as to what transpired that led to the death of the young man. “If you feel that you have evidence to tell us what you think.” “I have full confidence in the NCD CID.” He further added they have given a time frame for the investigation team to look into the matter and will be expecting them to put forward their findings in the near future.

NCD Metropolitan Superintendent, Silva Sika this morning has condemned the actions of the opportunists who took to the streets causing havoc yesterday, stating that police will not hesitate to deal with them accordingly and within the confines of the law. Sika while making his statement outlined that while the situation at hand is delicate, there are some out there that would like to take advantage of the aggrieved tribe members that took to the streets attacking people and members of the police force. He warned that people should refrain from such activities or face the consequences. “There are opportunist that have gone ahead to take this advantage of this situation and have a vested interest and gone ahead to social media and posting a lot of things to create chaos and problem in the city.” A large number of unknown assailants believed to be from the same tribe as the young man found dead earlier this week at Gordons, took to Boroko and Gordons, running riot and attacking anyone commuting during that time. Met Supt Sika further advised that people should not issue threats to the police and give time and space for the rule of law to take its cause.

As countries around the Pacific oppose the discharge of treated Nuclear Water into the Pacific Ocean from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power plant, Prime Minister James Marape has advised Parliament this morning that following dialogue with members from the Japanese Government caucus at the recent Pacific Island Forum meeting, they have given their assurance that the discharge is within “acceptable scientific levels.” “The Japanese Government have indicated that the transnational authority, International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA] has given certification that the discharge is safe for release and they will support pacific Island countries to have testing points in all maritime key areas.” Marape informed the house that the Japanese Government has given assurance that proper testing facilities will be established throughout various countries in the region to test the volume of toxicity in the waters. This was his response to concern raised by Opposition leader, Joseph Lelang of the potential risk and damage to the various ecosystems in the Ocean. “I want to ensure the opposition leader, that in no time will we be reckless, the health of our ocean is important.” He went on to state that they have been in close consultations with Japanese Government in respect to the compliance of international law in line with the health of the ocean and reports that they have indicated compliance and adherence.

Prime Minister James Marape has expressed his endorsement for the K27.377 billion 2024 Budget tabled in Parliament by Treasurer Ian Ling-Stuckey stating that the budget, anchored in the theme 'Securing Our Future,' reflects a commitment to propelling Papua New Guinea into economic prosperity with pro-development focus as well as continuing assistance to Papua New Guineans in these tough times. He commended Internal Revenue Commission (IRC) and Customs for their record revenue collections during a very tough economic period stating that both agencies have collected the highest-ever revenue without raising new taxes is a testament to growth in the economy. “The 2024 Budget signals a promising future for Papua New Guinea, underscoring the government's commitment to securing the well-being and prosperity of its citizens.” “As the country embarks on a path of sustainable growth, the leadership remains dedicated to fostering economic stability and resilience.” Comparing this budget to that of 2023 Budget of K24.567 billion, the 2024 Budget sees a notable increase of K2.810 billion, with revenues reaching K23.394 billion. A growth of K3.811 billion from the previous fiscal year's K19.582 billion. The positive trajectory is evident in the reduction of the budget deficit by K1 billion, showcasing a fiscal strategy where revenues outpace expenditures. “Projections indicate a significant boost in the economy, with an expected growth from K111 billion in 2023 to K122 billion in 2024, surpassing the K79 billion benchmark set by the previous O’Neill government.” The Marape Government, steadfast in its commitment to fiscal responsibility, continues its budget repair programme with the ambitious goal of achieving a surplus budget by 2027 and the potential to retire all debt by 2034.

The Earth Journalism Network in partnership with the Papua New Guinea (PNG) Media Council recently hosted a one day workshop in Port Moresby to help train and upskill young and upcoming journalists in specialized field of environmental reporting. The Earth Journalism Network (EJN) was initially developed by Internews in 2004 to enable journalists from low and middle-income countries to cover the environment more effectively. It is now a truly global network working with reporters and media outlets in virtually every region of the world. Their mission, which is to improve the quality of environmental reporting, sees the EJN train journalists to cover a wide variety of issues, develops innovative online environmental news sites and produces content for local media. PNG Media Council Secretary, Ms. Belinda Kora, a veteran journalist with over 20 years of experience in the field, who was also present as one of the speakers and facilitators of the Workshop, stated that reporting on Climate Change is different from any other topic covered in media, with certain nuances and skills associated in this field. “It doesn’t matter how long I’ve been in the industry in Papua New Guinea, the reporting for climate change I believe changes every year."

As the New Ireland police get set for the festive period operations, Provincial Police Commander (PPC), Chief Inspector Albert Beli has revealed that communities can and have the right to apprehend persons who may disrupt cause nuisance during the Christmas and New Year festivities. PPC Beli told PNG HAUSBUNG that if the communities in the province can, there are allowed to conduct a citizen’s arrest and detain assailants until police are alerted and arrive on scene. “If they can, why not. We can, within the communities, use the power to apprehend or arrest anyone that is committing crime or anything dangerous that may cause distress to the community.” The PPC emphasized that this is a pivotal piece of knowledge that he would like to pass on to the communities around the province. In Papua New Guinea (PNG), powers to effect a citizen’s arrest are given by statute law, namely the Arrest Act (Chapter 339). Under s5 of the Arrest Act, an ordinary citizen is empowered to arrest another person without warrant, if that person believes on reasonable grounds that such a person is either in the process of committing an offence or has committed an offence, where that offence carries imprisonment as its penalty. Under s14 of the Arrest Act, the ordinary citizen that is effecting arrest must at that point inform the arrested person that he or she is now under arrest and must also tell the person the reasons for the arrest and must then tell arrested person to accompany him or her to a police station or a court. Reasonable force may be used by the person effecting arrest to prevent the arrested person from escaping. Then s16 of the Arrest Act requires the person effecting arrest to hand over the arrested person to a police officer, or take or cause the arrested person to be taken to a police station, as soon as possible after making the arrest.

As the festive period gets closer, police in New Ireland will be looking to ensure that festivities remain civil and safe whilst celebrations are underway. Provincial Police Commander (PPC), Chief Inspector Albert Beli advised PNG Hausbung that the operation order for Christmas and New Year have come into post and all 81 regular and auxiliary police personnel in the province are set to conduct operations. PPC Beli stated that they will be trying to make sure that even though they may encounter challenges in movement of personnel, they will engage with the people on the ground in order to maintain law and order. “We will be utilizing village magistrates, village councilors and ward councilors, ward members and so forth because they are mandated leaders. This includes Church Groups, Public servants and Mama Groups” He said everyone plays a part in the society and is looking to engage with all stakeholders to take ownership of community law enforcement within their areas. As the commander on the ground, Beli is urging people to come forward if they see or experience any form of lawlessness. With plans already in place, Beli said they are looking at roughly K70, 000 to K100, 000 budget to conduct this exercise. He went on to state that they are working very closely with the provincial government to clamp down on alcohol related incidences this festive season and are looking to impose a liquor ban throughout Christmas and New Year. “Liquor ban is a paramount concern and as we get closer to the festive period, the New Ireland Provincial Government will be issuing a mini gazetted instruction, calling for the ban on liquor.” It is not yet determined the duration of the ban.

Internships have proven to be an effective means of adding much required skills within Civil Society groups and empowering emerging professionals. This is according to Transparency International Papua New Guinea (TIPNG) when welcoming its 6th intake of Legal Interns and its first ever Communications Intern on Wednesday 8th November. TIPNG has broken new ground by expanding the categories for short-term engagement of students from tertiary institutions in Papua New Guinea (PNG). In a statement, TIPNG Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Arianne Kassman stated that since their engagement with the University of Papua New Guinea (UPNG) to take on Legal interns, this has now helped them to expand. “We first began a formal partnership with the University of Papua New Guinea’s School of Law in 2017 to take on law students as legal interns during their end of year break, and the success of that collaboration has encouraged us to now include for the first time ever, a communications intern.” Over the past 6 years they have had a good number of law students through the TIPNG Legal Internship Program. “We have had a total of 17 law students empower people in Papua New Guinea to act against corruption, through the TIPNG Legal Internship Program.” “We decided to build on this program, by inviting Communications students from across all tertiary institutions in PNG to apply for our inaugural Communications Internship Program. Our Legal and Communications interns will work within TIPNG for the next 13 weeks, learning essential workplace skills and growing their professional network.” TIPNG’s Interns for 2023-2024 are as follows: • Communications Intern - Ms. Shirley Cherake, 4th Year CA, Divine Word University, • Legal Intern - Mr. Nabieu Lansana, 3rd Year LLB, University of Papua New Guinea, • Legal Intern - Ms. Abigail Kafafi, 4th Year LLB, University of Papua New Guinea, and • Legal Intern - Ms. Karen Bak, 4th Year LLB, University of Papua New Guinea. These internships have been made possible with funding from the TI Indo-Pacific Partnership for Strong, Transparent, Responsive and Open Networks for Good Governance (TI IPP STRONGG) 2020 – 2023. This funding assists chapters of Transparency International to contribute to reduced corruption in the Indo-Pacific region by empowering a strong and independent civil society voice and network that can mobilize action in support of increased accountability of public and private institutions nationally and regionally.

Following the formation of the Provincial Disaster Committee yesterday and the declaration of a State of Emergency (SOE) in the West New Britain province, SOE controller and Provincial Administrator Wilfred Augustine has advised PNG HAUSBUNG that the emergency teams have already been set up and have initiated their Initial Damage Assessment for the surrounding area. Augustine stated that it is not yet determined the amount of destruction caused by the eruption of Mt. Ulawun but has assured that they are doing their very best to work towards ascertaining that information. He said a Forward Operating Base has been established on the Ground and teams are already out on the field assessing the situation. “We are set up around the area and will be conducting operations into the affected places.” Meanwhile, the internally displaced persons from the affected communities surrounding Mt. Ulawun can now breathe a sigh of relief following word from Augustine that relief supplies will be available by this afternoon for distribution. It is not yet confirmed the number of displaced person, with some estimates making it out to be around 5,000 people. Augustine said they are now trying to establish how many people they currently have in 8 care centres set up within the Nakanai district and by tomorrow would have a confirmed number of the population that have fled due to the eruption. He said 8 villages have been displaced. “At this point, I want to call on the people to remain patient as we try to get everyone organized for relief supplies to get here, and I assure everyone that we are doing all we can to make sure our people are ok.” He adds that in regard to the full extent of the ash-fall experienced in the district, this is beyond that of the 2019 eruption. In the meantime, volcanic activity around the Mt. Ulawun has subsided but authorities have maintained that they are still monitoring the activity.

The Papua New Guinea (PNG) National Research Institute (NRI) have finally published key findings from their observations of the 2022 National General Election (NGE) in the Highlands Region and have concluded that the key issues have not changed from the previous election observation reports. According to the NRI, the issues are particularly around the matters with election administration and legal and integrity of the electoral process, such as the use of outdated common roll, block voting, double and multiple voting and also new trends, such as control and distributive voting by only few community leaders. Spotlight Vol. 16, Issue 17 by Research Fellow, Jeremy Goro, outlines that although many strives to make the Electoral Processes more transparent by many stakeholders including the Government, the issues remain the same. The PNGNRI, who is mandated to conduct applied social and economic research on a wide range of public policy issues, has been observing many elections and last year, the institute changed its observation approach to ethnographical by recruiting local observers to observe elections in six open electorates in the Highlands Region, including one Provincial Seat. According to Goro’s observation, there were new trends of voting observed in the 2022 NGE compared to the previous common voting practices reported in the previous election observation by the NRI of the 2007 NGE (May et al., 2011), Transparency International PNG (TIPNG, 2022) and Australia National University (ANU, 2018) reports. The common issues of polling in the Highlands of PNG reported by such studies included common roll, double and multiple voting, under-age voting and the ‘Tanim Box’ voting. These reports also highlighted unfair distribution of ballot papers where certain council wards got more ballot papers than the number of eligible voters while others got less ballot papers than the number of eligible voters. In 2022, the PNG NRI observation teams all reported the similar patterns of voting right across the Highlands Region. • Common Roll issues continue to be the most disappointing part of polling when voters did not find their names on the Common Roll (Defective Roll). As a result of the defective common roll, community leaders took control of the voting. • Control, block and distributive voting was seen as a strategy for convenience and to settle tensions (cooperative voting). A few people marked ballot papers on behalf of everyone. • Compromising of voting materials where the allocated with serial numbers ballot papers for specified polling locations were not delivered to those locations. • Lack of security for polling officials: Most polling places lacked security presence and officials had to flee for their safety when voters controlled polling, leaving the people to mark the ballot papers in their absence. The absence of security forces led to coercion, threats and intimidation. Due to these reasons, here are some recommendations proposed by the PNGNRI; • Election planning and logistics must be prepared in advance and implemented accordingly without late changes. • A new way of Common Roll Update needs to be introduced by integrating Ward Record System with National NID Project to be rolled out at the ward level and verified by Village Court Officials, Councilors and pastors with penalty for default, in order to ensure integrity of the Common Roll. • Voting must be free, fair and safe, where every eligible voter must be allowed to vote freely, fairly and safely in the secret booths to ensure that the outcome of the election is legitimate and credible. • Security operations must start with the campaign and end with the declaration. It must be more effective and efficient. This should be considered for future elections. • Need for at least three to five Electoral Commissioners through a change in the law, so that decisions are made by the Chief Electoral Commissioner with the Commissioners, which will be more informed than having one person make the decisions.

The Department of Personal Management (DPM) has announced its calendar of holidays for the festive period which will see most, if not all Government offices and Departments, closed for the remaining days following Christmas. This was announced by the Department Secretary Ms. Taies Sansan through a circular released recently. According to the circular all Government Departments, Provincial Administrations and offices of the National Public Service will cease work on Christmas Day and return to work a day after the New Year. “The Government has determined the arrangements for the Christmas and Holiday Shutdown. The Shutdown Starts on Monday the 25th of December (Christmas Day) and ends on Monday, 1st of January 2024.” “All Public Servants are to return to work on the 2nd of January 2024.” The Department Secretary also announced that the 3 days in which Public Servants be allowed to take time off, will not be accrued if not taken. Apart from this, public hospitals, law enforcement agencies and public utilities that provide essential services, will not shut down.

Police in West New Britain (WNB) have advised that they are now working around the clock to assist in the evacuation of the people of Mt. Ulawun, following its eruption earlier this week. Provincial Police Commander (PPC) Superintendent Peter Barkie told PNG HAUSBUNG that police personnel are now being mobilized and will be working to provide assistance to those displaced. Barkie said for starters they have restricted movement between East and West New Britain and have set up roadblocks to ensure movement from Mt. Ulawun is uniform and also to make sure that safety and security remains top priority for civilians. “We’ve done as a deterrent for those that want to use this as an opportunity to take advantage of the situation.” The decision to devise an evacuation plan follows an urgent Provincial Disaster Committee on Tuesday, in which K3million was budgeted to carry out the evacuation. “The committee met and through this we have declared a state of emergency in the province and will be moving to make sure our citizens are moved to safety. This is actually the biggest eruption since 2019.” He stated that they have been instructed to move villagers out to a 35km radius from the Volcano. He added that this is the initial phase of the evacuation efforts, today the committee will come together again to discuss how aid will be provided during the affected villagers stay. A relieved PPC Barkie was at ease after initial reports stated that no casualties have been reported as yet and hopes that this remains.