Transparency International calls for Release of Full Report on Manu-Manu Inquiry

Extracted from PNG LOOP | EDITED

The Transparency International Papua New Guinea (TIPNG) is calling on the PNG Government to make a report on the Manu-Manu scandal available for public scrutiny.

This report cost taxpayers K2 million. Media outlets have not been given access to the full report into the payment of K46m made to a dubious business entity for land allegedly valued at only K10, 000 in Central Province.

“The Administrative Inquiry was tabled on the floor of Parliament last Friday (13/04/18), and the following week the formerly suspended Lands Secretary and the head of the MVIL have gone to the courts to be reinstated to their positions on the basis of this completed Inquiry,” said Lawrence Stephens, Chairman of TIPNG.

“This is in addition to Ministers William Duma and Fabian Pok who were also sidelined and subsequently reinstated by the Prime Minister after the 2017 National Elections and before the Manumanu Inquiry report had been completed.”

Since its tabling in Parliament, TIPNG has attempted to obtain the Manu-Manu Administrative Inquiry Report from the Government Printing Office and been informed that the full report has not been released by the Chief Secretary’s Office as custodians of Commissions of Inquiry.

TIPNG is calling on the Chief Secretary and the Department of PM & NEC to release the full report on their public website as a first step to making it available.

“Now that the report has been tabled in Parliament, the people of Central Province, the general public and media outlets must have access to the findings of the Manu-Manu Administrative Inquiry and we must reflect on whether it meets its original Terms of Reference,” said Stephens.

“For the Manu-Manu Inquiry to be complete it must include documents pertaining to the valuation and sale of the land as well as the NEC decision resulting in the K46m purchase with funds from the implicated agencies and leaders.

“If the report is deficient in any of these aspects it is difficult to see how it exonerates either of the two Ministers or eight Heads of Departments.” – Via Garamut News.

Solomon Island ban logging to protect the forests, whilst PNG’s SABL remains the biggest land scandal ever

Extracted from MONGABAY NEWS | EDITED

The leaders of Central Island province, part of the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific, have decided not to issue new business licenses to logging and mining companies following a local petition and recent reports detailing the lack of sustainability and legality in the country’s logging sector.

Local and international organizations have blamed unsustainable and corrupt logging practices for destroying the islands’ sensitive habitats and creating civil strife among the people who live there.

Provincial governments in the Solomon Islands lack the power to block logging outright, leading Central Island province to take the licensing approach to stop new operations.

Central Island province in the Solomon Islands has blocked new logging and mining operations in an apparent attempt to halt the degradation of the archipelago’s sensitive ecosystems.

“With timber on the islands harvested at a hugely unsustainable rate, this is an important first step,” the London-based watchdog organization Global Witness tweeted on Jan. 14, 2019.

Timber accounts for nearly one-third of the Solomon Islands’ exports, according to a 2013 study by the World Bank.

In October 2018, Global Witness reported that companies were cutting down the country’s trees at a rate that was 19 times what could be considered sustainable.

The organization also found that more than 12,600 kilometers (7,800 miles) of logging roads snake through the country’s land area.

Central Island province, also called Central Islands or just Central province, is home to Tulagi, the colonial capital of the Solomon Islands, a group of islands stretching east of Papua New Guinea across 1.34 million square kilometers (520,000 square miles) of the South Pacific.

The national government holds the power to permit logging in the country, Patrick Vasuni, the province’s caretaker premier, told ABC Radio Australia. (Vasuni is officially a “caretaker” until the upcoming elections, expected in 2020.)

But companies must also obtain business licenses from provincial governments before they begin operations.

“That is the area we are banning,” he said, adding that the injunction came on the heels of a local petition to halt logging in the province.

Vaeno Vigulu, who heads the country’s forestry ministry, confirmed by text message to ABC Radio that the order hadn’t come from his agency.

Conservation groups have long warned that logging and mining are destroying highland, rainforest and coastal habitats throughout the country, along with inciting societal strife.

Global Witness’s investigation found that 82 percent of the Solomons’ exported logs end up in China, with much of it potentially having been harvested illegally, unsustainably, or both.

Meanwhile in Papua New Guinea, the Government is yet to publish a list of Special Agriculture Business Lease (SABL) obtained illegally.

It is publically known from the findings of the SABL Inquiry, that the land (some 5.3 million hectares of customary land) was leased illegally, without free, prior informed consent of the customary landowners (CLOs).

The Government has made a commitment of returning it to the landowners (legally it belongs to them anyway), but there's another angle also to consider. It is now taking five (5) years, the promise is not honored.

This action, or attempt to disenfranchise the landowners and steal their logs in many cases, was knowingly perpetrated across the country in a short period of time by a band of people.

This entailed officials working with a few customary landowners, sometime from elsewhere and purporting to be landowners from that land, together with a group of foreigners, who sometimes had the privilege of travelling back and forth from Malaysia in considerable executive comfort, we're led to understand.

If one robs a bank, or burgles a house and are caught there's inevitably a long spell in Bomana, Baisu or such facilities.

So, what about these land grabbers, is anyone (i.e. the police) progressing to put them behind bars?

It's not exactly a secret who they all were.

Many in PNG and globally are pushing for the Government to publish the full SABL list, it is one of the world’s biggest illegal land grabs, yet more than 5-years after the government promised to cancel the SABL Leases and return the rights back to the CLOs and nothing happen to date.

People are still waiting earnestly to hear the leases being cancelled.

It is also reported by local and international NGOs that the SABL leases, some of which land areas are largely covered by forest, being used to for carbon trading deals.

Over 50,000 square kilometers of land was stolen using illegal SABL leases between 2003 and 2011, since the Commission of Inquiry reported in 2013 the only leases confirmed as cancelled have been on the orders of the court. – Via Garamut News.

PNG Govt yet to publish cancelled SABL leases, illegal land grabbing continues

Tropical rain forest in Papua New Guinea. Image: Neomi Necolina Nikints Mhan

It is one of the world’s biggest illegal land grabs, yet more than five years after the government promised to cancel the SABL (special agriculture and business) leases and return the land to its customary owners, the people of Papua New Guinea are still waiting to hear which, if any, leases have been cancelled.

Last month the United Nations wrote to the government for a third-time, accusing ministers of racial discrimination against their own people for not implementing the recommendations of the 2013 Commission of Inquiry and cancelling the leases.

Previous letters from the UN have been ignored by the government and PNG needs to be much more transparent.

We have heard so many excuses and seen so much misinformation from the government for so many years that people have rightly lost all trust in our politicians.

Act Now! is demanding the government immediately publish a full list of SABLs showing the current status of each lease, including which have been surrendered, which have been cancelled and which still remain.

Minister Tkatchenko says he is serious about tackling corruption and wants his department to be honest and transparent. The best way to start is by publishing up-to-date information on all the SABLs.

The government also says it wants to attract foreign investment and has spent billions on APEC, but legitimate investors are not going to come to PNG while issues of corruption like the SABL land grab remain unresolved.

Although over 50,000 square kilometres of land was stolen using illegal SABL leases between 2003 and 2011, since the Commission of Inquiry reported in 2013 the only leases confirmed as cancelled have been on the orders of the court.

In January 2018, Tkatchenko promised all SABL leases would be reviewed by a joint committee but there have been no updates on progress.

In many areas foreign logging and oil palm companies are still illegally occupying land with tacit approval from Tkatchenko and the government.

Source: EDDIE TANAGO | Act Now! - edited version on Keith Jackson & Friends: PNG ATTITUDE