PNG Opposition to seek court to recall urgent Parliament sitting

Papua New Guinea Opposition leader Don Polye has challenged the government saying that the Opposition will not stand down and will ensure to see that the Vote of No Confidence (VONC) motion is passed on the floor of parliament and that he will be filing an application to the courts to allow Parliament to sit in the next 5 weeks.
“Two national issues of utmost urgent importance was not addressed on the floor of parliament, the Vote of No Confidence and the Students hurt in their cry for security to march to their house and present their petition to the Prime Minister and he must have mislead Parliament to run away from this problem and this matters that should have been addressed was not addressed and we are not happy the Opposition is very frustrated”, said Don Polye

He added that the Opposition has now done three strategic steps in filing a court order to ask the Supreme Court to recall parliament to sit in four to five weeks time for the important national issues to be addressed, the second is that the Opposition is now instigating court process to prosecute members that make up the Private members committee that deals with private motions because they have been breaching the constitution in relation to the VONC after rejecting it three times with no valid reasons.

Finally The opposition has also welcome the UPNG Students petition and are prepared to take the petition of the Prime Minister on behalf of the students and interact with all stake holders and relevant bodies to ensure their petition is met.

Meanwhile, the Opposition has welcomed the Commission of Inquiry (COI) that PM Peter O’Neil is planning to set up to look into the unrest and subsequent shooting and wounding of unarmed UPNG Students.

Polye said the Terms of Reference however needs to be overarching looking at the student’s issues, to take into account the governments conduct and it has to be fair and transparent and that Police should not be involved in the commission of inquiry. Instead an outside individual from Australia or NZ should head the COI with the inclusion of a Senior Defense Officer or CS officer to stress the importance of a firearm. Press Release