The Government will introduce amendments to the Proceeds of Crime Act to include provisions for Unexplained Wealth. Minister for Justice Bryan Kramer said the Prime Minister James Marape has directed that these changes be made and brought before Parliament to be passed. “The Unexplained Wealth provisions when passed under the Proceeds of Crime Act, will be used against public officials whose wealth exceeds that which cannot be explained by their legitimate income.” “The organisers and beneficiaries of financially motivated crimes are often very good at distancing themselves from criminal activity and concealing their source of wealth.” “They are seldom directly involved in criminal activity, but will profit significantly from it. Even those who are directly involved can commit crimes without leaving an evidentiary trail or destroy that trail.” “People who profit from crime but cannot be proven to have committed it, should not be able to keep the benefits of their activities unless they can prove that their wealth has been legitimately acquired,” Minister Kramer said. The key features of the Unexplained Wealth provision are: • The unexplained wealth provisions will apply to public officials as given the meaning under the Organic Law on ICAC. • The State may apply to the Court for an unexplained wealth order against a public official. This application may be made in conjunction with an application for a restraining order under the Proceeds of Crime Act, or at any other time. That is, a restraining order does not need to have been made in order to apply for an unexplained wealth declaration. • The Court must make an order against a public official if the Court is satisfied that there is a reasonable suspicion that: (a) The public official— (i) has engaged in one or more serious crime related activities; or (ii) has acquired, without giving sufficient consideration, serious crime derived property from a serious crime related activity of someone else, whether or not the person knew or suspected the property was derived from illegal activity; and (b) any of the public official’s current or previous wealth was acquired unlawfully. • The value of unexplained wealth is calculated by subtracting the person’s lawfully acquired wealth from their total wealth. • The amount so calculated must be paid to the Government. This debt may be satisfied (wholly or in part) through the confiscation of property covered by a restraining order under the Proceeds of Crime Act. It is otherwise payable to the State. • There will be a safeguard in the provision to allow the Court to refuse to make an unexplained wealth order if the Court is satisfied that it will not be in the public interest to make the order. “These amendments to the Proceeds of Crime Act are not a panacea-a solution to all our corruption issues. They are however, important changes to legislation that are designed to complement other laws such as the Whistle Blower Act, and the Independent Commission Against Corruption Act,” Minister Kramer said. “Prime Minister Marape has led the efforts of this Government to curb corruption, and the new laws, and the Unexplained Wealth provisions to go before Parliament, demonstrate that political will.” All these measures by the Government have seen PNG’s ranking on the global Corruption Perception Index move 18 places from 142 in 2020 to 124 out of 180 countries by 2021.