A good number of police personnel will take to the streets on New Year’s Eve in Mt. Hagen to conduct foot patrols as they plan to ensure that the New Year is being welcomed in a more sensible way.
That’s from Western Highlands Provincial Police Commander (PPC) John Sagom said there will be motorized patrols as well but they will be focusing on the Hot Spot within the City to make sure that opportunists do not take advantage of the celebrations to cause problems.
He added that since they reintroduced the foot patrols back into the city, police have been well received by the general public.
“All in all the response by the general public as to the conduct of the police, they are all very happy with the police presence and how we have been reacting to every incident within the city.”
PPC Sagom further said it is his belief that the police in the province, with the support of the PNG Defence Force have proven to the city residents that they are there in the province to ensure peace and order.
“We want to ensure that as city residents go out and about to do final preparations for New Year celebrations, we will make sure that none of our people get attacked or injured in any way.”
Meanwhile, they are waiting on an official report to determine facts behind a vehicle that burnt down at a major road in the city.
Superintendent Sagom, who was there at the scene, described the situation to be almost fatal with the driver making it out of the vehicle moments before being engulfed in flames.
“The traffic had come to a stand-still because the Fire Servicemen had to put out the fire before it spread or anyone else would get injured.”
Sagom stated that traffic was held up for quite some time as the Fire Service worked to put out the fire and then remove the vehicle from the road.
The vehicle was transporting goods from an undisclosed location when the materials on board burst into flames.