When I was vice chancellor of the Papua New Guinea University of Technology (UNITECH) from 2012 to 2018, I met O'Neill only a few times and always in passing.

During these meetings, I tried to convey that I came to PNG only to contribute to university development and was not at all interested in politics, Pacific Games, APEC or any other of the white elephants he loved to herd.

O'Neill loved to talk big, steal big and then lie about it to cover it up.

The main purpose of the big events such as the Pacific Games or APEC was to assure sufficient kick-backs on the building contracts for infrastructure, which inevitably had to be built for the occasion in Port Moresby.

Afterwards the management was so weak that an all-you-can-steal buffet occurred for him and his associates.

Evidently, in the process, he wrecked the economy, with the non-mining sectors declining every single year he was in power - from 2012 to 2018.

I’m sure he was not happy when I pointed out in a lecture at James Cook University that, in order to achieve the goals of Vision 2050, economic growth must be kept above 5%, a goal he never achieved.

Who can forget how O'Neill literally barged into the supreme court and took power in 2012? How he rigged the 2017 elections? How he tried to curtail the judges by proposing a ludicrous Judicial Conduct Act? And how this was only stopped by protest of the UPNG students?

His regime was never legitimate and a total disgrace.

I am afraid I was unsuccessful in convincing O'Neill of my intentions not to be involved in PNG politics.

In his paranoia before APEC, he decided to get me, as well as the other foreign vice chancellor, dismissed and, in my case, arrested.

Corruption has a way of turning things upside down: the guilty roam around freely, and the innocent go to jail.

The last time I saw him, at the end of 2017, he insisted that I should "keep the students out of politics".

Although I do not share this idea, I assured him that we would revise the SRC constitution in order to introduce some checks and balances, which would make it harder for students to call an indefinite boycott every time they saw something they did not like in the university administration or the government.

After all nobody, including the students, wants to prolong a boycott culture. Of the six years I spent in PNG, there was only one year - 2015 - that there was not a class boycott at the universities, often lasting two weeks or longer.

As a result, many students dropped out and missed their only chance to get a higher education.

Evidently, he did not share my approach, deciding instead to suspend the SRCs, in the case of UNITECH indefinitely.