PNGBLOGS

by PNGBLOGS Prime Minister Peter O’Neill’s shady business dealings are heating up as he seeks to hide his massive money-laundering operations and legitimise his wealth. The latest news from within his Remington group is that he is reviving his satellite communications business, which was a gold mine from inflated Government contract s before he sold it to Digicel a couple of years ago. Remington has registered two new business names for the satellite subsidiary, B2B Solutions and S2S Solutions, and operations are soon to begin. His former business, Remington Communications, was secretly sold to Digicel in mid-2013 for between K30 million and K40 million. The sale to Digicel, is highly suspicious. O’Neill was making a fortune out of the business from fake and/or inflated contracts with Government departments. For example shortly after he was appointed Treasury and Finance Minister by the Somare Regime in mid-2010, O’Neill secretly ordered the Finance Department to purc

by PAUL FLANAGAN Executive Summary The 2016 Budget appears to have failed in its constitutional requirements to appropriate sufficient funding for the activities of government This includes servicing debt (amortization). The Opposition is correct to highlight the absurd differences between the 2016 and 2017 budgetary appropriations But the error appears to be in the 2016 budget One that was rushed through without the chance for adequate democratic scrutiny by the Opposition Holders of Government Bills and Bonds may now have to pay the price – as they did in the Kokopo Loans Affair And possibly the public more broadly. A Supplementary Budget should have been passed at the start of this week to correct the possible constitutional error that had already been pointed out to government by a local PNG analyst (my hat off to her – PNG needs more local analysis and women leaders such as this). In 2016, after allowing for the Supplementary Budget, only 56.7% of required expen

by P AUL FLANAGAN Executive Summary The 2017 Budget was a missed opportunity for restoring credibility in the Government’s economic management. Vastly different measures for GDP are included throughout the same Budget document – not a good look for international investors and credit rating agencies LNG values are assumed to increase in the 2017 Budget by 16% while recent World Bank forecasts indicate a fall of 35%. Using official BPNG figures, and updating them for the lower growth forecasts in the 2017 budget, a recession is confirmed: (using the measure most relevant for measuring progress on PNG’s living standards) real non-resource GDP per capita is expected to fall from K2,479 in 2013 to K2,282 in 201 7 this is a fall of 8% in average living standards in PNG. According to official estimates from Treasury and BPNG, it will now take until past 2023 to get back to 2013 standards of living (see graph below).  PNG is officially facing another lost decad

by PNGBLOGS The O'Neill Dion Government has used its numerical strength to bulldoze through an illegal and fraudulent budget. In what they describe as their "final budget", the Government and its MPs have deliberately passed this hoax budget which has hidden in it some K10 Billion in loans the government has accumulated illegally outside of the budget during its 5 year term. In an ultimate act of betrayal to the people and the country, they used their numerical strength to legitimise an illegal act on the floor of Parliament. The Opposition, being the true and loyal guardians of our constitution and our Parliamentary Democracy had to walk out of Parliament in protest as the Acting Speaker and the Clerk both allowed Parliament to be hijacked by the Executive Government. A very very sad day and yet another low this nation has faced under the rule of this most controversial PNC led government. The government did not count on the opposi

by PNGBLOGS Prime Minister Peter O’Neill’s greed and corruption is on show again in the 2017 Budget, with K40 million allocated for his personal use. The slush fund is a new allocation, under the Treasury and Finance Miscellaneous category, entitled Prime Minister’s Commitments. Also in this category is K3 million for “PM’s Official Staff Determination Payouts”. Treasury and Finance Miscellaneous can be viewed on Page 187 of Volume 2a, 2017 Budget Estimates of Revenue and Expenditure for National Government Departments http://www.treasury.gov.pg/html/national_budget/files/2017/Vol2a-Revenue%20and%20Expenditure%20National%20Govt%20Depts.pdf No details of the new slush fund have been given. No reference was made to it in the Treasurer’s speech. No details are available of who or what the K40 million is to be spent on. There is no evidence of any acquittal requirements. This is a slush fund pure and simple and the Prime Minister and his Treasurer are trying to keep it secret

by PNGBLOGS   Prime Minister Peter O’Neill and Treasurer Patrick Pruaitch have been caught out in a massive Constitutional breach over state borrowings and repayment of the national debt in 2015 and 2016. Their failure to comply with Section 209 of the Constitution means all domestic debt – Treasury Bills and Inscribed Stock - issued in both years, and repayment of that debt, is technically illegal. The unlawful amount involved will be about K10 billion by the end of this year. The Constitutional breach and the failure to acknowledge and correct it highlights the incompetence and lack of integrity of the Prime Minister and Treasurer. It highlights the complete disregard by the Prime Minister and his Regime for the laws of Papua New Guinea, including the Mama Law. The Constitutional breach was identified by blogger Kessy Sawang, a financial analyst and former Deputy Commissioner of Papua New Guinea Customs Service, and Head of Secretariat of the Tax Review Se

by  MICHAEL J.PASSINGAN  Sources within an Australian Real Estate firm have been exposing prominent Papua New Guinean MPs and Public Servants  to PNGBLOGS who have purchased properties in Australia via dubious means. The latest is Sports, Special Events and APEC Minister, Justin TKATCHENKO. P NGBlogs recently exposed the recent purchase of a property by MINISTER TKATCHENKO and his family at BROOKFIELD outside BRISBANE, AUSTRALIA. MINISTER TKATCHENKO lied through his teeth in Parliament when he said he gave up controls to his parent company KITORO NO 33 . Truth is he is still solely involved with the company operations with his wife. Papua New Guineans have been duped again by JUSTIN TKATCHENKO with a purchase he made prior to entering Parliament when  he was the sole owner of Kitoro No 33. In 2010 it was alleged Tkatchenko received over K3 million in payments from the National Capital District through his landscaping companies Kitoro No.33 and PNG Gardner. It is claimed th

by PNGBLOGS The 2017 Budget handed down yesterday confirms fears that the cost of APEC is far more than the K3 billion estimated by a recent International Monetary Fund report on PNG. The allocation for this year is K250 million, taking the total cost to at least K3.8 billion over the four years 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018. The current cost of K3.8 billion will rise even more when the Budget allocation for 2018 is announced at this time next year. The IMF report stated that “the government plans to spend K3 billion over 2015-18 on the preparations for APEC 2018”. Prime Minister O’Neill told Parliament last week that “the amount mention by IMF is utterly rubbish, inaccurate and not true.” But the IMF estimate is based on figures provided by Treasury officials during meetings in 2015 and earlier this year, and is likely to be very conservative. Further increases in expenditure are possible as the Prime Minister and the APEC Coordinating Auth

by PAUL FLANAGAN   PNG’s 2017 budget was a key opportunity to demonstrate the credibility of the government’s economic management before next year’s election.  It fails. Foolish games with numbers and unrealistic assumptions severely undermine the budget’s credibility (detailed examples on the revenue and expenditure side are provided below). Indeed, the level of deception arguably approaches fraud. This preliminary assessment of the budget documents will be updated over the next few days.  Hopefully more good will be found in the detail. A major winner from the budget are overseas petroleum shareholders with proposed cuts in the company tax rate from 45 or 50% down to 30%. This will be of particular joy to Oil Search and others that will gain from a new possible Papua LNG project – but they are possibly accessing the lower rate for condensate already. PNG’s tax regime for the petroleum sector was already considered generous relative to world standards – it now will be even