Improvement funds have not been spent properly
28 June 2012
JOE WASIA
THE MP FOR DEI OPEN, Puri Ruing, has rebutted as baseless a number of allegations raised by councillors in his electorate relating to K50m in improvement (DSIP) grants given to the electorate over the last five years.
However, we know that according to the Provincial and Local Level Government Act, every elected MP is entitled to K10 million DSIP fund annually.
Puri Ruing claimed that all 109 MPs were given a total of less than K20m a year. That’s baseless and does not make any sense.
If he didn’t make use of this K50 million in funding during his five year term in parliament, that’s his problem.
Some MPs have been using these funds to bring much needed services to their people. One example is Sam Basil, the MP for Wau Bulolo.
Other MPs have never used these funds to the maximum as required by law. One good example is Miki Kaeok, the MP for my own Wapenamanda electorate.
Elected MPs have no reasons for poor service delivery in their electorates. If they haven’t make use of this legally guaranteed funds, why should they stand again in this election?
Just leave it to others who can do it. People suffer enough when elected MPs enter parliament as ordinary men and come out as millionaires.
We have billions of kina budgeted every year by the government but there is so little transferred to the real world.
What this country needs is transparency, accountability and good governance which will drive this nation forward.
Currently there are high levels of corruption in all offices from national level right down to local level. And that’s very dangerous.
None of the current and former MPs and bureaucrats has been transparent in their dealing with the people’s money. Some of them pretend to be honest but they are worse thieves in the night.
In these elections we have to be selective in choosing good leaders.
Only if we elect honest and transparent leaders will PNG will be rescued. A transparent heart is what PNG needs.
Yes, it's by the amended law that every electorate must access K10,000 a year under DSIP.
MPs like Ruing said goodbye last election because they never never did anything with his K10,000 annual grants.
Posted by: Paul Pako | 10 April 2013 at 08:40 PM
Joe, this is the truth of Papua New Guinean MPs. It's a disgrace.
People are suffering while so-called elected MPs are becoming millionaires.
Posted by: Kaiam Kaula | 28 June 2012 at 10:56 AM
Joe, I think there must be a way to stop this corruption.
It is true, that if you elect honest and transparent leaders then PNG will be rescued. But in any electorate I'm sure there would be voters voting for people who they really did not know very well and could not be certain if they were honest or not.
As the party system is not well developed these candidates have not been double checked for their honesty by the party.
Let's be honest. Many of the people getting elected to parliament are not well educated and won't really know how things should be done so can easily be manipulated. They have probably not had experience in handling large sums of money in their own lives and so are hopeless when it comes to handling the country's monies.
Meanwhile, in the Public Service, there should be people who are well educated and trained in the handling of large sums of money, called accountants!
The money should be going to the various departments where these well trained public servants should be able to spend it wisely e.g. repair the hospitals, schools and roads etc, staff the hospitals and schools etc, buy supplies for the hospitals and schools etc.
The DSIP grants should be stopped at once and the money should be given to the various government departments.
The member of parliament has the job to see that the relevant government department fixes up his local hospitals, schools etc.
An ICAC needs to be set up at once so that any public servant found to be misusing the government monies can be investigated.
Posted by: Mrs Barbara Short | 28 June 2012 at 06:11 AM