Exclusive Leak:The O’Neill Regime is borrowing more money this time from funds held by Kumul Petroleum to try to avoid bankruptcy
The O’Neill Regime is borrowing more money – this time from funds held by Kumul Petroleum – to try to avoid bankruptcy.
An NEC policy submission from Petroleum and Energy Minister Ben Micah is seeking a K100 million cash advance from the company
The submission seeks to formalize what amounts to theft of Kumul Petroleum funds – it is supposedly an independent company with an independent board charged with making independent decision in the interest of the company.
Instead it is being used as a slush fund for a corrupt and incompetent Government that has driven the nation to the brink of ruin.
The Government can get away with this because Prime Minister Peter O’Neill now controls all the House of Kumul and the funds the group holds.
Mr O’Neill, known internationally as the most corrupt and untrustworthy Prime Minister in the history of the Pacific, was recently made sole trustee of Kumul companies.
He can do what he likes with the companies and no one can stop him. The submission to NEC requesting the cash advance is just a cover-up.
It is in line with stripping cash from all State-Owned Corporations to feed the State and its crooked cronies, usually through corrupt contracts with huge kickbacks.
Mr Micah’s submission states that the cash advance will be repaid to Kumul once PNG LNG landowners buy their 4.2% equity in the project from the State. It is not known when the landowners will be in a position to pay for their equity.
The K100 million adds to the funds the State has already obtained from Kumul Petroleum using similar tricks.
In October last year it contributed K450 million to the Supplementary Budget which was supposed to solve the nation’s financial problems but in fact made them worse.
And there was as much dishonesty in that deal as the present one.
Kumul Petroleum chairman Frank Kramer described the 2015 payment to the state as a dividend. But it was not a dividend, it was a cash advance, the same as the present payment.
Even worse, Kramer stated that the payment came out of cash flows, when it did not. Kumul had insufficient funds to meet the State’s demand for money, and used money borrowed from ANZ, Westpac and BSP.
Kumul Petroleum is still paying off the BSP loan of K450 million.
That the company remains short of cash is evidenced by the fact that the Kumul Petroleum board recently resolved not to pay further dividends this year.
This series of cash demands on Kumul Petroleum (and oter SOEs) highlight the lack of transparency and accountability in State coroporate and semi-corporate operations.
For example no part of the House of Kumul has published an annual report and financial statement. Almost all other SOEs are the same, the subject of scathing criticism by the Auditor-General.
Most if not all SOEs and their managements are in breach of a multitude of laws, many of which are criminal in nature.
It is this, more than anything else, that allows kon men like Peter O’Neill and Ben Micah to steal and waste public funds without fear of punishment.
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