The Changing Face of Lae City's East Taraka suburb , PNG

 By John Rosso ,Lae MP, 

East Taraka is one of Lae's oldest suburbs where alot of our senior citizens have resided in and built our beloved city of Lae, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea .

Forty years ago, East Taraka had sealed roads, street lights, permanent homes, movie cinema and was a peaceful and safe community.

Women and girls walk freely at night without being harassed or threatened, taxi services and businesses operate freely without being robbed and the streets were clean and beautiful.

In the last twenty years saw a decline in service delivery to the community. It's roads were riddled with potholes, street lights not working, rubbish weren't picked up by the council etc. and continuous neglect from the government has forced the once peaceful suburb to become a safe haven for criminals.

Numerous pleas to the government to fix the East Taraka roads have been unsuccessful.

Since being elected into office, Member for Lae John Rosso decided to shift the common paradigm by focusing on fixing services that are lacking in communities in Lae. Five years won't be enough time to fix issues which have escalated for many decades, but Rosso was optimistic in restoring pride in his hometown.

It was challenging working against a system which was hellbent on misusing and siphoning public funds and neglecting the very people that pay tax for services.

In 2020, the Lae City Authority signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) with the Morobe   Provincial Government and Internal Revenue Commission to have 20% of the total GST returns to Morobe be given to Lae City.

From that 20% GST returns, LCA committed this funding towards upgrading and sealing suburban roads in Lae City. In just twelve months notable maintainance, upgrade and sealing were carried out at Bumbu road, East Taraka, Papuan Compound, Kapiak street, Karoka street and now Eriku and two mile to three mile area getting the same attention drainage and sealing.

The East Taraka road upgrade is being constructed in two phase. Phase one is the construction of proper drainage, upgrade and sealing of the main street roads and phase two will see all smaller streets at East Taraka.

Prior to that was the upgrade and sealing of the UNITECH to Tent City road funded by the Marape-Basil government. This is a testament of Rosso's key involvement and participation as a senior cabinet minister in the PANGU-led government.

This comes as a relief for many road users who had waited forty years for this important road to be fixed. 

Vital government institutions including schools, Igam Army Barracks, police barracks, PMV owners, small business owners and the general taxpayers were relieved by the road upgrade.

For East Taraka, it wasn't just the road upgrade. A new market facility will now be built to support the economic sector in the suburb.

SME and youth empowerment programs were also rolled out with men and women being trained under LCA's SME training program and given start up capitals to operate their small businesses.

East Taraka youths have been presented with a brand new dump truck that will enable them to go into SME by looking after the new market and assisting LCA in garbage collection within their community.

Religious groups in the community are now getting recognition from the LCA under its church partnership program.

Sporting activities in the community were also supported with the recent completion of the annual Rosso Cup Sports challenge and support towards their local sporting competition.

The community also had their playing field placed under trust of the LCA. This now protects businesses and individuals from stealing their recreational field. 

Several longtime residents who applied for their land titles and waited for decades were also given their land titles through a program initiated by the Ministry of Lands under Lands Minister John Rosso in partnership with the LCA.

With the new Igam township containing 1300 houses to be constructed by this year, brand new hospitals at Tent City and West Taraka, East Taraka is poised to be brought back to its glory days in the next five years.

Taraka in the Kotec language in Morobe means 'end' or 'pinis and arere' in tok pisin. Soon there will be an end to lawlessness, lacking basic services and end to an era of misfortune and neglect.

Taxpayers at East Taraka and elsewhere in Lae city deserve better services for the taxes they pay. Rosso is fixing one suburb at a time and catching up on forty years of neglect by successive governments and local authorities.

With good prudent management of limited funding from the government, putting in place strong governance systems and fostering good strong partnerships with all stakeholders, Lae is becoming a conducive and safer economic hub in Papua New Guinea.

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