About K300 million allocated for the 2022 National General Election (NGE) has been allegedly diverted to fund government ministers without control.
However, yesterday afternoon the Prime Minister James Marape responded that he was not privy to the report.
The K300 million is from a total of K650 million allocated through for the 2022 National General election allocated through the 2022 National Budget.
The 11 page Prime Minister’s special brief from the PNG National Intelligent Organization (PNGNIO) dated Monday 28 November, 2022 indicated a total of K650 million was allocated through the Budgetary allocation in the 2022 National Budget but only K350 million of the funding was released to the PNG Electoral Commission (PNGEC) while unconfirmed reports received by the NIO alleged that the reminder of K300 million was believed to have been diverted to fund politicians during the election period.
Prime Minister James Marape said that he was not preview to the report on the alleged diversion of funds but as a government they have allowed the Parliamentary Committee on the 2022 National General Election to look into such reports.
He said if there is any merit in the report than the Committee will look into it in a bipartisan approach and if there is any indication of any impropriety on their part of the Electoral Commission or any other persons or agencies then they will not be immune to the state anti corruption agencies like ICAC, Police Fraud Squad and Ombudsman Commission to deal with leadership to deal with them.
Meanwhile on the report further stated that the election security budget was uncoordinated with many other security line agencies unaccounted for or receiving their funding very late including others being funded below their security operation budget estimates.
The Report from the office of the Director General of PNGNIO Mr Frawley Walsh Terence indicated that the funding situation simply meant that key security agencies were unable to execute security reconnaissance operations to pin-point hotspot areas around the country ahead of the election.
The report further stated that from all indications, it appears that the PNGEC has not conducted prior need analysis of the situation on the ground before going into the elections.
It stated that even if they did, all indications suggested that planning was done late and hastily.
The report said PNGEC being the lead agency for the conduct of the 2022 NGE, all other relevant agencies would take their que from the PNGEC hence, this had a dominion effect particularly on RPNGC and the PNGDF, the two main agencies responsible for security, a vital aspect of the 2022 NGE.
He stated that the facts and data used to inform any action in this election appears to have been copy pasted from the 2017 NGE but without taking into account current factors and trends on the ground.
Mr Terence said in the report that the police had not even prepared their operation plan for the election until one month prior to the issue of writs.
He said given the scale of operations, it was poorly done and insufficient to cater for all eventualities, and this was evident in the execution phases of the security operations where there was poor planning on the part of the key stakeholders.
He said this had a domino effect on the smoot conduct of the whole election process.
Former Prime Minister and Opposition spokesman Peter O’Neill is now calling the Government to acquit the funding allocated for the 2022 National General Election and make the report public.
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