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Showing posts with the label OIL

SEE WHAT THE GOVERNMENT IS DOING IN THE NAME OF FOREIGN INVESTMENT?

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by TERRY SEMBO STEP BACK MENTALLY AND CONSIDER FOR A MOMENT WHAT OUR GOVERNMENT IS DOING IN THE NAME OF FOREIGN INVESTMENT: They have opened the door to every Tom, Dick and Harry foreign invader to come into the country. Too many are worthless carpetbaggers smelling the prospects of big profits for their pockets and not giving a damn about PNG or its peoples. The reason why we attract so many unscrupulous investors is because our country is, overall, a poor investment prospect in terms of high risk. Yes, high profits, but only if you get around all the risks. The government acts like the Supreme Pamuk in dealing with foreign investment and foreign investments. There is a story from the early 2000s when InterOil came sniffing around PNG and had a meeting with Mining and Petroleum Engineer department top cats. The InterOil representatives apparently were neither polite nor tolerant of melanesian niceties. They got straight to the point and said, you either do things the InterOil wa

EXCITING TIMES YET CHALLENGES AHEAD FOR PNG EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRY SECTOR

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by KOMBOL GIBSON   PNG is endowed with a $19bn oil and gas industry. The size of this industry is set to double and almost triple. It’s an exciting prospect for PNG but challenges remain for delivering that blessing to every man, woman and child in PNG. In fact the opposite is happening. PNG should be concerned. There is a large focus on Government-funded programmes in the Hela and Southern Highlands Provinces instead of a more equitable arrangement for all 21 Provinces in PNG. That is a story for another day and a subsequent article, but the upshot of this focus on Hela and SHP is that the vast majority of it ends up in the hands of elites from these Provinces that reside elsewhere, access health services in Port Moresby or overseas, send their children to school overseas, maintaining multiple wives and mistresses and invest in Port Moresby or overseas. So roughly 80% of funding that gets diverted to Hela and SHP ends up in the pockets of Ministers, MPs, senior public servants, a