"We are voting for road access into Mt Bosavi region," said Mr Andrew Awabi, who is the Chairman for Mt Bosavi Sustainable Agriculture Development Inc. For decades and generations there has never being a road access into the Mt Bosavi region and the people of Mt Bosavi have being cut off from the rest of the country. “Mt Bosavi lies between four (4) provinces, part of it towards the Western Province side, another part to the Gulf side, other side toward the Hela Province and the other part towards the Southern Highlands Province, however it is sad to see no road access from any of those provinces into Mt Bosavi,” said Mr Awabi. The people of Bosavi have being missing out on many development and service initiatives and they have being struggling for years, especially mothers and children. There is no proper education services, no proper health services and other government services have being absent in the area and the people are hoping that this election will be different and this time they will not miss out on any government services. “We are voting for road access into Mt Bosavi, we want to travel on a vehicle and our kids need to see what a vehicle looks like in reality, our mothers need to access better health services especially during labour,” said Mr Awabi. “We sometimes travel by MAF and get basic education and health supplies and other supplies, however this has stopped after our airstrip was shut down because of the lack of maintenance and for years now we are walking the jungles of Bosavi to get to the nearest province,” he stated. Mr Awabi mentioned that, to travel from Southern Highlands Province into Mt Bosavi, they catch bus down to Waro in Mendi and from there they walk through the jungle, cross the Kikori River and spend about a week walking and sleeping in the jungle before reaching Mt Bosavi. He also stated that to come into Mt Bosavi from Western Province is quit closer because you only spend up to 3 days to walk to reach Mt Bosavi. “We cannot continue to walk, we need road access so that basic services can reach us and we can send our kids to better schools and get better health services outside and most importantly find opportunities to be economically independent in terms of selling our produces,” Mr Awabi said. Mr Awabi also highlighted that, the people of Mt Bosavi are hopeful that come next general election, the Electoral Boundaries Commission can make Mt Bosavi an electorate of its own so that they can elect a leader from their own area who is fully aware of the situations faced by the people and can represent them on the floor of parliament. He also stated that they would prefer to come under Western Province as most of their customs, traditions and lifestyle is similar to Western Province and it’s much closer to Mt Bosavi. “For now we can only be hopeful that whoever is elected into parliament will make a road link from Mt Bosavi into the nearest province, because road access is our biggest need. If we have road access all other services can easily follow”, he said.