WHY I WILL NOT RESIGN
PRIME MINISTER OF PNG
THE ONES WHO STAND TO MISS OUT AND SUFFER IN THE LONG RUN
Indeed, it was the seven million Papua New Guineans that decided in the 2012 General Election with an overwhelming majority to elect the current Prime Minister Hon. Peter O'Neill to lead them for the next five years. Our innocent citizens in the wider section of our communities, particularly our rural population that are now enjoying Government services for the first time in 40 years, have not benefited directly or progressively.
This nation does not need any fomn of economic, political, social and civil instability at this critical time of development and progress. As Papua New Guineans, we have a duty to respect the rule of law and ensure our cultures have a lasting impression of our beautiful country. The opportunity has arrived for us to impress the international community and in doing so, we gain their respect and recognition as a country with enormous wealth and potential, politically, socially, culturally and economically. One fine example of our good people exercising respect for the rule of law is the 20 LLGs in Simbu.ln all these times of confusion and misinformation,
Our good people in Simbu have realised the damage they could have done to themselves if they had gone ahead to stage a public demonstration without understanding the facts and the motive of the forces behind the demonstration. On Monday July 2nd, our good people threw their undivided support behind the Prime Minister Peter O'Neill and brushed aside calls by certain sections of their communities for the PM to step down. The President of the 20 LLGs sent a fomnal apology to the Prime Minister condemning the threats issued by a minority group to shut down the Highlands Highway and disrupt other public services. We applaud and salute the positive attitude of our law abiding citizens of Simbu. We can only hope that more cross-section of our people in similar situations follow the fine and responsible attitude displayed by our good people of Simbu
A PEOPLES CALL FOR APPROPRIATE AND DRASTIC ACTION
1. The real culprits involving a network of interested individuals in the Prime Minister's Office and outside the whole process that ensured the K71.8 million payment to go through the PM for his signature, that are now hiding behind the NGOs and Civil Society Groups and propagating The call for PM to step down be dealt with. They must be immediately Identified, arrested and charged for their role in the saga.
2. The Police Commissioner must identify and flush out the entire network of rogue policemen involved in the investigations, from the top to the rank and file, and stabilise the police force.
3. The Police Commissioner must appoint a new investigation team and analyse evidence against the Prime Minister, if any, and accord him the necessary protocol by “inviting him" as the Chief Executive Officer of this country to come forward for an interview with the investigation team.
4. Based on evidence ori hand, the investigation team should cast their net further and come to the bottom of the saga, they should instigate immediate arrest of the principal of Paul Paraka Lawyers and politicians involved to establish the actual beneficiaries in the payment
5. That former Treasurer Hon. Don Polye be asked to furnish the original and authenticated signed letter by the Prime Minister involving the K71.8 million payment to police in order to establish clarity and put all arguments to rest.
PM must not step down we should not allow this to happen.
lt is in the welfare and the interest of the masses of our people that the Prime Minister Peter O'Neill must maintain office, however the truth of the whole saga must be revealed through a credible and unbiased process. In the past three weeks, the legal fees payment of K71.8 million to Paraka lawyers has been twisted into a political battlefield and the saga is simmering by the day with more twists and turns that are now threatening the very essence of our Constitution and our future growth and development towards a prosperous country.
This single issue has dissected the demographic landscape into two varying political divides;
1. Promoting the political ambitions of a handful using the NGOs and Civil Societies network to propagate their self-interest, and secondly:
2. Masses of our population in remote districts who are beginning to see some glimmer of hope and the effective delivery of services and goods to the majority rural peripherals after 40 years are been deliberately left out and their right to welfare is ignored in the whole saga.
WHY THE PRIME MINISTER SHOULD BE ACCORDED THE APPROPRIATE COURTESY AND WHY OUR PRIME MINISTER MUST NOT STAND DOWN?
As simple people we must stand firm and withstand any undue influence and not be misled by a few aggrieved and greedy politicians who have nothing tangible to show for but more vengeance to fight for their own political gains and mileage.
Peter O'Neill has delivered where others have failed. Hence. we must ask ourselves the following questions;
1. Who are the real culprits behind the paper trail of payment that ultimate􀄩 pushed for the PM's signature?
2. Has the Prime Minister personally gained?
3. Is the Prime Minister being used as a scapegoat in a smart cover-up and made to look guilty by the real perpetrators?
4. Who approved the engagement of Paraka Lawyers to provide services to the State which rendered the outstanding bill ofK71.8 million?
THE FACTS;
1 Investigations and facts must start with who manufactured the letter and who brought it to the Prime Minister for his signature. This argument is not being argued nor raised by anyone; hence the real perpetrators are walking free without being listed for questioning.
2 The Prime Minister is a complainant in the issue. The State Agencies mandated to uphold the rule of law are now hell-bent on arresting him as the principal complainant while the actual perpetrators and beneficiaries in the payment sit back, and quietly enjoy the scene as it unfolds to see an innocent Prime Minister, the Chief Executive Officer of this country, being put through an unwarranted shame and blame tactic. Is this how we treat the person that; brings us water and food to our table-Where is our Melanesian way?
3. The PM's legal team when making an application to restrain the police in the first place was basically on grounds that the investigating authorities and other State agencies involved may have compromised their neutrality and that there may exists signs of the element of bias in the dispensing of their duties in lieu of a proper and transparent investigation.
4 People who have received these monies are not being prosecuted. The contractual engagement of Paraka Lawyers was agreed upon by the previous regime of Somare/Temu Government in which sacked Attorney General Kerenga Kua was a private lawyer. Hon Kua was at all material time one of the private lawyers engaged by the Somare regime to advise and recommend to the State the engagement of Paraka Lawyers
5. Somare/Temu Government briefed out legal work which saw the engagement of Paraka Lawyers, Possam Kua Aisi Lawyers, and Pato Lawyers/ Steels Lawyers, Havey Nii Lawyers, and other smaller Law firms to provide legal services to the State. This occurred at that time and Hon. Kua should be in a better frame of mind to put an end to all this insanity.
6. The Moti Affair or the Sand line crisis, have much more significance then the payment saga which has no evidence comparable in significance to the constitutional crisis this country has encountered, to warrant any call for the removal of the Prime Minister.
7. The National Court on Monday July 1, 2014 dismissed an application by the Prime Minister Hon. Peter O'Neill stopping police from effecting a warrant of arrest against him in relation to the K71.8million payment to Paraka Lawyers. The ruling of Judge Ere Kariko now gives police the leeway to proceed and exercise their powers under the Constitution.
8. The wording “arrest” of the Prime Minister has been grossly misinterpreted in the saga and must be replaced immediately by police with the word" invite"- a more appropriate wording by way of protocol in respect to the status of the Prime Minister. Arrest should be applied to fugitives on the run or anyone person absconding jail.
9. No-one is immune from the laws of this country and the Prime Minister, as a law abiding citizen, has publicly welcomed the decision by the National Court.
10. The Police Commissioner Geoffrey Vaki can now assume full authority over the Investigation and appoint a full team of experienced and dedicated officers he firmly Believes can restore transparency in the whole process.
The consequences of our ignorance and brainwashing/International stage
The whole saga comes at a very critical time when this proud nation of 800 different cultures and tribes plays host to our Melanesian brothers and sisters from Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji and West Papua, including our neighbours from across the Torres Strait. the Australian Aborigines. They are at our shores as part of the Melanesian Festival of Arts and Culture.
lt also comes at a time of the Melanesian Spearhead Group meeting to be hosted by the Government. the official visit of the Japanese Prime Minister to PNG to be received and hosted by the Government. the 2015 Pacific Games that is poised to be hosted by the Government. and the larger global event of the 2018 APEC Leaders' Summit that will assemble the likes of US President Barrack Obama, or his successor and leaders of all major superpowers on our shores
.
With these major events looming at the background, the welfare of our ordinary citizens across the length and breadth of this beautiful nation have been totally disregarded in the current saga.
THE ONES WHO STAND TO BENEFIT FROM THE REMOVAL OF THE PRIME MINISTER
By the wisdom of our own ambitious leaders, our people have been pushed into the fringes as voiceless bystanders. We watch helpless as our political leaders, particularly those with political vengeance and gain-at all scramble with their momentum of greed and ego -centric agendas to try to force the Prime Minister of this great nation to step down. What a time for all this unnecessary power struggle!
It is no doubt our civil servants mandated to manage this matter at its earliest stages, might have been compromised But it's the Seven Million citizens of this nation that gave the 111 leaders the mandate to represent them on the floor of Parliament who deserve the benefit of doubt regarding the rationale behind the push to remove the Chief Executive Officer of this country, barely two years into his five-year term in office. The 111 Elected Leaders in Parliament representing the Seven Million Citizens of the country owe the truth to our people as to why the Mandate they bestowed on the Prime Minister has now become “grab at all cost mandate” by few faceless and selfish politicians who hide behind NGOs and Civil Society Groups to create confusion and disorder in our country in order to grab what they want.
