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News from the National Capital District of Papua New Guinea sivarai.ncdc.gov.pg May 2018

Famous Hiri moale FestivalShowcasing our culture to the world P14

iNsiDeGovernor Parkop visits Shenzhen Sky rail to connect Port MoresbyNCDC staff graduate from Divine Word

WalK & YoGa For liFeFormer rugby league star walks for his life

2018 APEC SUMMITWhat it means to PNG

Commonwealth Games Medalists Inspirational efforts by the weightlifting trio from Hanuabada - P15


Hon. Powes Parkop, LLB, LLM, MPGOVERNOR - NCD

Bernard KipitCITY MANAGER

ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018WELCOME ADDRESS | SIVARAI2

It’s time to change our attitudes & mindset

Road works for more accessibility in the city

Ican’t believe we have almost completed the 1st quarter of the year and time is indeed running very fast. We have just had our new City Manager and at NCDC and at my office, we have been very busy. We have four major pillars or pri-orities we want to pursue including Upgrading settlement

to suburbs, Modernizing Motu Koitabu Villages and continue to upgrade all the suburbs and make our City safe and peaceful by reducing violence and crime.

While these are critical programs that will further transform our City these goals on their own will not really shift the City unless we also change and improve behavior and attitude of our people in the City and indeed the whole country

Being Governor and Member of Parliament for the last 10 years has convinced me that unless we improve our behavior by subscrib-ing to higher values like respecting ourselves and each other, taking responsibility and ownership, choosing peaceful means to address issues and grievances, all our efforts elsewhere in developing our City and our country will fail. So I am going to get a bit serious on this topic, as it is very important for us as a city and as a nation.

These last few weeks have been particularly interesting for me personally as I have seen how people are so motivated by poor judgments and leadership. At NCD we have spent huge amounts of money on infrastructure development, also on skills training for our young people, on ensuring adequate infrastructure development to health centers and schools around the city - however, we fail to ad-dress the most important pressing issue effecting us all - that is our behavior, our attitudes and our mind-set. All developments are futile in a society that is not willing to embrace universal and our Mela-nesian values of respect, being responsible and kind, peaceful and mostly according the care and respect for our fellow human beings, not forgetting for public utilities, infrastructure and joining together to make our city safe, clean and healthy and making it safe for our women and girls.

I know that our people have the capacity for change and under-standing of the importance of good behavior as I have spoken to many young people who are motivated, inspired and willing to be-come better citizens. I have sensed their hopes, their aspirations and their unthinkable obstacles just to be accepted in society. How our girls have gone through huge trauma just to be who they are, to express themselves jeopardizing their own personal safety, their freedom, risking rejections and intimidations by cowardice men out there. Not all of us, but there are many of us out there who can be better men in caring for our women.

I want to remind all of us, that our behavior and our attitude is very important to building a society, improving the economy, en-suring job satisfaction, job security and living sustainably for a long time with good healthy habits, lifestyles, family values and good solid principles to hand over to our next generation. We have to under-stand the measure of any society lies in how we treat our women and girls and everyone with dignity and respect.

We have to forgo our foul habits of defacing the city with graffiti, spitting and littering, engaging in crime, harassment both physically, emotionally and digitally and using foul language and swear to and at each other. We all have a right for our voices to be heard in the world. We have to do unto others what we wish to be done unto our-

selves. We have to have at least some basic level of human decency to stop painful, hurtful, destructive behavior patterns that decrease our value as human beings.

I will continue to invest on such development promoting non-vio-lence, behavior and mindset change and engaging in a more holistic approach to make our people and our city safe and healthy, phys-ically, mentally and emotionally. Behavior change does not happen overnight, it takes time and we have to keep doing our part repeat-edly to ensure this awareness and this understanding gets into the core of our being as a lifestyle habit. We cannot change the city with broken up people with bad habits, bad attitudes and poor education. So whilst we will focus on our key priority areas of upgrading all set-tlements to suburbs and modernizing of our Motu Koita villages, we also have to focus on creating a city that is safe, active, smart and clean.

In my recent visit to Shenzhen our Sister city among the things that stands out was that it was a very clean and green city. One could hardly see rubbish any where in the city. Nor would you see graffi-ti or destruction to public property. They planted trees and flowers everywhere so it was a very green city. We later learnt that it was relatively a safe city too where men and women could move around without fear of harassment or being attacked anytime of either day or night.

It is one of the major growth centers of China with a population mainly of migrants. It use to be a sleepy fishing village of about 130,000 35 years ago. Now it’s has completely change and is a suc-cess story because among other things it’s based on respect, respon-sibility, non violence and taking ownership of the city.

On my way back from Shenzhen I got offloaded in Manila, Philip-pines due to problems with Air Niugini. And though I stayed just a day I marveled at how a city of 27 million can function and thrive and still be clean and safe with not much graffiti similar to the problems we face in Port Moresby.

I recall too when we visited Jarkata in 2013 with Prime Minister Peter O’Neill how that a city of about 30million can also be relatively safe and clean and respectful despite its many challenge.

Around the cities of the Pacific like Honiara, Port Vila, Suva, Christchurch, Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne etc these cities are rel-atively clean and safe for all. Respect, responsibility and ownership are key values upon which these cities are based and as a result they thrive.

I don’t know why, in Port Moresby we need securities in markets, bus stops and other public places. We are the odd city out. Unless we take on and shift our people’s attitudes and behavior, all that we are developing and building elsewhere in other sectors will be futile. This is also true of whole country. We spend more time, resource, energy at fixing problems created by our poor values and behavior and not enough on building the future.

We must equally lift in this area to secure a better and greater City. We will and are doing our part. I need our residents to also do their part.

I wish everyone a Happy Mother’s Day this weekend. God bless our mothers in our motherland.

Port Moresby is undergoing a remarkable turnover in infrastructure facilities in what is the most unprece-dented development ever to have taken place in the city.

The city is in a transformation hype and almost every-where there is an activity taking place - major or minor - but one that is set to make an impact on the overall appearance of Port Moresby.

The critics are entitled to their views as is normal for any change to take place in society but looking at the broader picture, Port Moresby as the capital city of Papua New Guinea, the seat of gov-ernment and administration deserves standards of higher standing and be able to show to the rest of the world that we have what it takes to provide to international requirements.

The development as it is happening has obviously brought about a degree of inconvenience for everyone in the city and the concerns are well understood and appreciated. As a responsible and account-able municipal authority, NCDC has well and truly accorded the public all due apologies and the relevant calls for safety precautions in and around the affected areas. These inconveniences are bound to reduce in intensity over a period of time as the developments progress and as the picture gets clearer towards the end.

Notwithstanding the complaints and the public protest, all con-cerns should be focussed on the end result of the development pro-ject, a most modern road link that will give added impetus to the modernity of our city.

The new modern highways and the relevant infrastructure devel-opment complementing each other are all designed to deliver a new modern outlook for Port Moresby with facilities that are equal to the best in the world.

The development projects were set in motion in the city to meet the growing demands of the city relating to traffic congestions and the limited open spaces for the recreation of city residents. Over the years Port Moresby has been opened up and conveniently linked up through inter-suburban connection with wider and smoother roads

that has definitely saved cost and time and surely productivity. And the need became more and more apparent for Port Mores-

by when Papua New Guinea successfully raised its hand to host the all-important Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation (APEC) meeting this year. Port Moresby was the obvious choice to host the event and among the preparations in place is the further upgrading of road infrastructure in the city.

So much has been happening in the city recently as the race to get the work done in time intensifies.

Apart from the Commission’s development initiatives, which have been ably supported by the National Government, the Govern-ment and the people of the Republic of China have come forward to assist Papua New Guinea’s preparations for APEC.

The projects are fully funded and implemented by the Chinese government and include the rehabilitation of the Poreporena Free-way, the construction of a six lane boulevard linking Parliament House to Waigani Drive and the just completed International Con-vention Centre at Waigani.

All relevant projects now in progress are due for completion be-fore the APEC summit meeting as Port Moresby readies to welcome the respective leaders of the 21 member countries including their entourage.

Port Moresby will be a busy city leading up to the November meeting as all participating nations are likely to bring in large dele-gations given the magnitude and importance of APEC. Among those to be present will be the international media to beam the summit out of Port Moresby to the rest of the world.

The APEC event will bring the focus of the world to Papua New Guinea as discussions unfold on the various economic fronts of the APEC member countries.

I ask all residents to support the changes happening in our city as we look forward to a time of prosperity and growth.

All relevant projects now in progress are due for completion before the APEC summit.

We all have a right for our voices to be heard in the world. We have to do unto others what we wish to be done unto ourselves.

More on sivarai.ncdc.gov.pg



Motu Gadona

In the last edition we learnt the word namo (nah mo), its meaning and its appropriate usage as spo-ken in the Motu language.In this issue, we look at the oppo-site of namo to demonstrate the contrast of its usage in everyday conversations. As pointed out earlier, the version of Motu used in the city is a pidginised form of the pure Motu language and is used mainly for communication with the non Motu speakers.So when we say Namo to mean good, the Motuan word for its opposite is Dika (dee - ker) meaning bad.Dika is stated in the same context as Namo as previously discussed to infer to badness.Dika has several other meanings, it can also mean spoilt, unwell, unpleas-ant, foul, disgusting, terrible, wicked etc. You will note that Motuans use one single word as a general notion to mean a wide range of things.The circumstances vary in the use the word and it can be used as a direct connotation or an indirect connotation.When used to enquire on someone’s welfare or condition, dika is often used as response to explain one’s condi-tion. Unlike Namo where it is asked directly, one would, depending on his or her condition respond accordingly if he/she is not okay thus bad, unwell, unpleasant etc.For example: Oi namo? Lasi lau dika. Literally you are responding by stating the opposite.Similar to the context in which namo is used, Dika is used to know the condi-tion of a material thing or a situation… Inai Motuka be ia dika (This vehicle is bad) or Inai gabu be ia dika (This place is bad) Dika is more a descriptive word to de-scribe situations or circumstances and is often used in response to questions on favourability.Ia be gabu dika na dekenai ia noho – He/She is living in a bad placeNega be ia dika – The weather is badMotuka be ia dika – The vehicle is not good/badAi emai mauri be ia dika – Our liveli-hood is unpleasant.Ia be dika tauna – He is a sinful manWords normally used to compliment or qualify dika include the following; Dika herea – Very BadDika momokani – Really BadIa dika noho – going from bad to worseIn a phrase, dika is used as such. Eda city Port Moresby be do ia dika momokani bema momoru ita negea kava neganai. Our City Port Moresby will be very bad if we continue to litter carelessly.Until the next column, Eda City Port Moresby ita ha dika ia lasi – Let us not spoil our city.

LEARN

motuISSUE 79 | MAY 2018 SHENzHEN CITY VISIT | SIVARAI 3

For all enquires/complaints or for any information on the services of NCDC in the City.

Be our ears and eyes, report to us any illegal operations or activities around your neighbourhood.

Help us to serve you better.

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BERNARD KIPITCity Manager

24 HOUR HOTLINE

180 0002 (Toll Free)

with Udu Vai

NATIONAl Capital District Com-mission has secured a total of K120 million from Shenzhen City Municipal Government to develop education and road infrastructure .

The infrastructure develop-ments that are taking place in-clude Moresby South electorate including the upgrading of Butu-ka College (K90 million) and the upgrade of Scratchley Road (K30 million).

The NCDC delegation led by NCD Governor Powes Parkop and lands Minister and Moresby South MP Justin Tkatchenko met Shenzen Deputy Mayor Ai Xuefeng in Shenzhen, China last month and secured the funding from Shen-zhen City Municipal Government.

Parkop said that the funding was a gift as part of the arrange-ment under the Sister City agree-

ment. NCD and Shenzen have signed a Sister City agreement in 2016 to assist each other.

Governor Parkop said that he was happy to secure the funding.

“I met with the Deputy City Mayor to discuss projects in the city. We both expressed satisfac-tion in the progress of our rela-tionship. In a short time we have seen the relationship prospering. We need to progress the relation-ship because when Port Moresby is developed, PNG will also devel-op. “

Parkop said that Port Moresby can learn from how Shenzhen city transformed from a rural fishing town to a modern city within 30 years.

“This city was transformed in 1985 when it was just a fishing town with only 300,000 people. Now it is a buzzling city with su-

per highways, sky scrapers and other sophisticated infrastructure developments with a population of about 20 million people. The city was developed by migrants from other parts of China which is similar to Port Moresby,” he said.

Parkop said that companies based in Shenzhen are now build-ing roads, schools and hotels in Port Moresby.

Meanwhile lands Minister and Moresby South MP Justin Tkatch-enko said that he was happy for the Shenzhen-based China State Construction Engineering Corpo-ration (CSCEC) to be building 52 classrooms, 12 teachers’ apart-ments and a multi-purpose hall for Butuka College in his elector-ate.

“Currently Butuka is a top-up school and will be upgraded to college level,” says Minister

Tkatchenko. According to CSCEC, the build-

ings will be built using fire-re-sistant concrete and steel compo-nents.

The school will accommodate up to 3000 students and may need 52 teachers.

The project is expected to be completed by August 30.

Each of the classrooms can hold up to 50 students.

Tkatchenko said that Mandarin will also be taught in the school.

Chinese president Xi JinPing is expected to use the upgraded Scratchley Road project as an op-portunity to also open the school during the Asia Pacific Econom-ic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders meeting in November.

NATIONAl Capital District Gover-nor Powes Parkop says there are plans to build massive infrastruc-ture projects in Port Moresby with steel products from China.

The projects to transform the city include sky-rail trains to link Port Moresby to the Sogeri Moun-tains in Central province and a new China town for Chinese investors to reside and establish business activ-ities to develop the economy in the city and the nation as a whole.

“We will also build mini sport stadiums in suburbs throughout the city, build foot bridges, flyo-vers, shopping malls and many other infrastructure projects,” Governor Parkop said.

The statement came last month when he visited the mas-sive automated steel production factory of China Construction Steel Structure Corporation in Huizhou, Guangdong.

Governor Parkop said that he had already funded a feasibility study worth K500,000 from his Provincial Services Improvement Program funds to construct the

sky rail project.“The proposed sky rail will be

built from Adventure Park at 14 mile to link Sogeri valley. It will boost tourism activities in the Sogeri valley by linking the Koko-da track, Variarata National Park, Crystal Rapids and the Sirinumu Dam,” he said.

Parkop said trekkers walking the rugged 96kms Kokoda track from Northern province to Owers’ Cor-ner could use the sky rail to come down to Adventure Park and go to their hotels in the city.

“City residents and international tourists can use it to go up to Sog-eri valley to buy fresh food from the local villagers, visit the Sirinu-mu Dam, Crystal Rapids and the National Park,” Governor Parkop added

However Parkop said that he wants the Central Provincial Gov-ernment to assist him implement the project.

“I also plan to build a new China town near Jack Pidik Park at the old Telikom land site to encourage Chi-nese investors to live in Port Mores-

by and create business activities to grow the economy. The p roject is now ready to be implemented.”

Meanwhile CCSSC Chairman Wang Hong said that construction developments in Port Moresby were very expensive.

“So bringing fabricated steel products from Huizhou and Shen-zhen to Port Moresby to assemble and to build infrastructural pro-jects is cost-effective,” he said.

Hong said Port Moresby has a sister City Agreement with Shen-zhen to develop infrastructure pro-jects in Port Moresby.

“For a city to be developed, it

must invest in infrastructure pro-jects and education,” he said.

Hong said that they were now doing so in Port Moresby by build-ing the Butuka College in Kilakila, Hilton Hotel at Hohola and the up-grading of the Scratchley Road in Badili.

The delegation including lands Minister and Moresby South MP Justin Tkatchenko, NCD City Ad-ministrator Bernard Kipit, City engineer Frank Ravu and NCDC’s financial consultant Augustine Ravi were on a five day trip to strength-en the sister City relationship with Shenzhen.

shenzhen helps in city transformation

Plans to build PNG’s first skyrail The NCDC delegation led by NCD Governor Powes Parkop and Moresby South MP and Minister for Lands & Physical Planning Justin Tkatchenko visiting the massive automated steel production factory of China Construction Steel Structure Corporation in Huizhou, Guangdong.


The sky rail will be built from Adventure Park at 14 mile to link Sogeri valley. It will boost tourism activities in the Sogeri valley by linking the Kokoda track, Variarata National Park, Crystal Rapids and the Sirinumu Dam.

NCD Governor Powes Parkop


ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018SHENzHEN CITY VISIT | SIVARAI4

We were guests of the Depu-ty Mayor of Shenzhen Mr Ai Xuefeng and

the China Steel Construction Engineering (CSCE) Ltd. This is the company that the Shenzhen Municipal Government en-gaged to build our new college, the Butuka Shenzhen Friend-ship College.

The college symbolizes the Sister City relationship between our two cities. I signed an MOU in 2016 to make Shenzen our sister city. This college will be the first in PNG in where we will have a three-in-one campus comprising of an elementary, primary and secondary school. It will also have an indoor and outdoor sporting complex and cafeteria.

We ended the official trip to Shenzhen with a visit to the mas-sive assembly and fabrication plant owned the CSCE in Huizhou which is about a one hour drive from Shenzhen.

What impressed me about the visit wasn’t just the massive size of the assembly and fabrication plant but significantly more was the lack of workers in this massive plant. In the entire gigantic build-ing comprising of various stages of formulating steel to customer design, we hardly saw any human work force.

In a country of almost 2 billion people, many I believe would love to work in this innovative plant. The absence of workers therefore was a big surprise to me and all of our delegates.

Instead of using a human work-force to complete the stages of as-sembling and fabricating, all of the work was being done by robots, including cutting and welding. It was an astonishing cutting-edge technology at its best, and it also spoke volumes for the future.

This technological advance-ment will not just have an impact on the production line and quality of products and services, it will

completely change the nature of the economy and how we humans relate to the economy in terms of employment and our overall life-style.

This is not just a feature or an ad hoc decision by the assembly plant. It was a well thought out plan and vision for this giant com-pany that started in 1985 as part of the State-owned mother com-pany called China State Construc-tion Engineering Company.

Their future goal is to devel-op steel to a level and capacity which can enable them to be part of inter-planetary travel and settlement, building space cit-ies as depicted in the Star Wars movies, building floating cities in the oceans of the world and also building undersea cities.

I was totally wowed by this vi-sion when we visited their steel museum on the first day of our official trip. The museum tells a very powerful story of human progress since the discovery of steel. It takes you through the history of how steel was devel-oped, enhanced and used to build industries generally but particu-larly to build infrastructures and monuments all over the world today including the Eiffel Tower in Paris and other land marks like the Golden Gate Bridge in los An-geles.

At the end of the tour we were ushered into a 3D cinema where we were given their futuristic vi-sion of how steel will take human civilization and technological ad-vancement to another level. The sky is no longer the limit. It seems, a vision we only see in movies can be a reality soon.

While that might seem like something we all dream of, I can’t begin to imagine what would it mean for us in terms of economic development and lifestyle into the future? Because it is already hap-pening. It’s here now.

We have to start waking up to a reality that employment and the economy as we know now it, will

not be the same as it is today. Hu-man doctors, nurses, engineers, pilots, factory workers especial-ly in steel fabrication, might be a thing of the past. Instead we will have these professions filled by artificial intelligence - robots - as is already happening in China as I write this.

Humans in the near future will have a lot of spare time on their hands because almost all man-ual work may be out-sourced to robots. Professional jobs could be outsourced as well. lifestyle and service industry, arts, music, sports and entertainment will be the mainstay of human activities in the coming future.

The physical, mental and man-ual aspect of human activity could be and can be outsourced by arti-ficial intelligence.

Where does that leave us hu-mans? We may have to spend more time on holistic and life-style industries, those hard to outsource to artificial intelligence robots.

How we are employed, how we utilize our time and sustain our-selves will be a big challenge in

this robotic future. This is a sce-nario that is devoid of the reality in PNG but it will happen sooner rather than later. It’s already mak-ing a presence in the most popu-lated country in the world as our visit showed.

This is a company that has K2 trillion worth of contracts all over the world and is ranked 24 out of 500 top companies in the world. It is a giant global company that is investing in and already utilizing artificial intelligence on a massive scale. It’s vision is to perfect, im-prove and out source more so they

can be competitive and relevant into the future.

That’s means we in PNG and the world generally must start to wake up from our comfort zone and ignorance!

It has already started PNG. Don’t be complacent. We need to dive into the future with a positive outlook and dare to dream the im-possible. I ask you to see the world in new perspectives and be coura-geous, different and futuristic!


What impressed me about the visit wasn’t just the massive size of the assembly and fabrication plant but significantly more was the almost lack of workers in this massive plant. In the entire gigantic building comprising of various stages of formulating steel to customer design, we hardly saw any human work force.

NCD Governor Powes Parkop

The NCDC delegation led by NCD Governor Powes Parkop and Moresby South MP - Minister for Lands & Physical Planning Justin Tkatchenko accompanied by City Manager Bernard Kipit, Project Manager John Makop and Senior Engineer Frank Ravu visiting the massive automated steel production factory of China Construction Steel Structure Corporation.

Are we ready forartificial intelligence?

Governor Powes Parkop recently visited Shenzhen, and was amazed by the level of automation in one of China’s leading steel production companies.


ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018 GENDER BASED VIOLENCE | SIVARAI 5

reinforced by Deputy City Manag-er Community and Social Servic-es lulu Ted who has a passionate commitment on the part of NCDC for a safe, clean and healthy city of Port Moresby for all.

“It is to ensure that everyone is allowed to move around freely on the streets. markets, shopping malls, bus tops, beach, and sub-urbs.”

“The responsibility for a safe city lies with all of us. Port Mores-by is our home and we must make it safe for ourselves and our visi-tors to come and enjoy,” Ted said.

Male attitudes towards women and girls - and everyone for that matter - have been singled out as a case for concern and must be appropriately addressed to create an environment where the culture is vibrant, youths can express themselves positively, families can have a good time out, women and girls can move from point A to B without fear of being harassed.

“ And that is possible” says Ted, “...we can make this city a safe and livable city if we all stand up and

say to no to street harassment.”NCDC Social Services Manager

Kila Dick said while the focus is for a safe Port Moresby, the big-gest challenge faced is the multi-cultural make-up of the city. Port Moresby is regarded as a mini Papua New Guinea and the diver-sity is such that barriers need to be broken down to overcome is-sues in the city.

“This is a challenge for us and our efforts to address the prob-lem is sometimes difficult but we are not deterred to minimize all the harassment that is currently happening in public places,” said Dick.

Other issues such as varying levels of literacy for understand-ing and appreciation adds to the problem and often the many awareness initiatives of NCDC and UN-Women are grasped with different views and perceptions.

But the bottom line says Mr Dick is “the fact that women and girls deserve the respect from all of us and the values of our moth-ers, aunties and sisters must be understood and appreciated by

everyone.”“I am putting this challenge

now to all the young men to ap-preciate and recognize the im-portance of women in this city and country as a whole,” Mr Dick emphasized.

During the anti-street harass-ment week NCDC, UN-Women and the Sanap Wantaim Youths in NCD staged an awareness rally at Tabari Place to end street harass-ment.

There were a series of activities throughout the week to highlight negative behaviours and to en-courage positive social interac-tions between women and men, girls and boys in our streets, mar-kets, bus stops and other public spaces.

Sanap Wantaim youth male representative Jackson Manu-ai Kiap thanked NCDC and UN-Women for their support in making the event a success.

“We have to reclaim our streets and make it safe so that everyone can move around and do what they want to instead of living in fear,” Kiap said.

EVERy now and then in streets around the world including Port Moresby, there is an incident of an unwanted whistling call, unnecessary comments and de-mands, stalking and touching of a woman or a girl.

These incidents get to seri-ous extents with sexual assaults, rape and many other anti-social behavior perpetrated against fe-males.

These are commonly seen and known behaviors of the male gender towards women and girls and sadly the situation is unabat-ed and has continued to cause a great deal of suffering to our womenfolk in society.

Women and girls being openly harassed in our streets and public places must be stopped immedi-ately in our society.

This stand is taken as a matter of serious concern in Port Mores-by in a joint effort of the Nation-al Capital District Commission and UN – Women to reclaim the streets in NCD to make it Safe for women, girls, men, and boys and for everyone including the visi-tors.

NCDC and UN–Women took the stand during the Anti-Street Harassment Week from April 8 – 14, 2018 as was marked and ob-served worldwide in 40 countries to highlight the situation and to stop all forms of harassment in

public places such as markets, bus stops and streets.

The Anti Street Harassment Week program added to the NCDC/UN Women partnership initiative for a safer Port Moresby and is among a range of different issues being addressed on safety in the city.

Country Representative Susan Ferguson said UN Women is in-volved because if women cannot move safely around the city then having access to services will be difficult.

“They can’t go to markets and take their kids to schools,” stressed Ferguson.

The situation does not guaran-tee the safety of women despite the known fact of a woman’s contribution to the welfare of the family.

“We all know that women take their produce to markets and they are more likely to spend their income on household devel-opments.

“They are more likely to pay school fees for their children and invest in better nutrition so that their family can eat balanced meals every day.”

“When women feel unsafe to move around doing these things then it has economic impact in our city of Port Moresby,” she ex-pressed directly.

The UN-Women concerns were

street harassment must stop(Right-Left) Community & Social Sercive Manager Kila Dick, UN Women Country Rep Susan Ferguson, Deputy City Manager Community & Social Services Lulu Ted and the safe city team.

Every weekend, there are fairies in Nature Park PORT Moresby Nature Park cel-ebrated the successful launch of Fairies in the Park on Saturday MAY24.

The fairy village, a collection of miniature fairy houses and hidden fairy doors, is now open every day to the general public. The fairy activity corner, with the park’s very own real-life fairies and elves, can be visited every Sat-urday and Sunday with face paint-ing and fairy craft activities from 9.00am to 2.30pm.

Parents can also book fairy par-ties for their children on the week-ends - but it’s important to note that pre-bookings are essential.

Michelle McGeorge, Nature Park’s General Manager, said: “Fairies in the Park is really for the children. It’s important to encour-age children to use their imagina-

tions because it is a tool in their development. let them come to the fairy village and explore, hang out with the fairies, get their faces painted and just have some fun.”

Fairies in the Park will run until Mother’s Day on Sunday May 13 2018.

For more information on Fair-ies in the Park visit the Nature Park facebook page, call them on 3260248 or email [email protected].

Port Moresby Nature Park is a non-profit organisation that relies on the generosity of the National Capital District Commission, the business community and park visitation.

“The responsibility for a safe city lies in all of us. Port Moresby is our home and we must make it safe for ourselves and our visitors to come and enjoy.

- Deputy City Manager - Community and Social Services Lulu Ted

Nature Park staff dressed as fairies and elves for children to visit and have some fun.More on sivarai.ncdc.gov.pg


ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018NEWS iN BRiEFS| SIVARAI6

Staff undertake Monitoring & Evaluation trainingTHE Policy Division is embarking on overhauling in-house Moni-toring & Evaluation (M&E) sys-tems and tools.

This is necessary in order to ef-fectively track and report against the National Capital District Commission’s Annual Work Plans (AWP) which his essential to sys-tematically assess the progress towards the deliverables of the organisaition’s Corporate Plan.

To this end, an up-skilling workshop for the Corporate Ser-vices Department’s staff was organised from April 16 – 20 at lamana Hotel.

Managers and officers from the department attended the week-long event organised by the Pol-icy Division and facilitated by Denny Beiyo and his team from Vital Solutions.

The objectives and the scopes of the M&E Capacity Building workshop was designed to be more hands-on, participatory and aimed at building confi-dence, knowledge and skills across a range of technical M&E skills in addition to progressing the development of M&E report-ing tools.

The workshop targeted the di-visional and program managers, program officers and coordina-tors of the Corporate Services department of NCDC.

Given the concerns about lack of effective program level M&E reporting, the workshop includ-

ed a focus on ensuring a program level M&E reporting template was developed and reviewed as an output towards the end of the four day workshop.

In his opening remarks Dep-uty City Manager for the Corpo-rate Services Department Pinio

Kalus thanked everyone for at-tending and encouraged them to learn the skills imparted by the facilitators in order to imple-ment them at work.

“It is a good program, make use of this opportunity and learn as much as possible,” said

DCM Kalus.He encouraged the managers

to make use of the M&E tool and make it work, adding the report-ing system of the department should be uniform.

The Acting Manager for Pol-icy Division in her closing re-marks thanked Vital Solutions for covering all areas of the topic throughout the week.

On behalf of the DCM Corpo-rate Service and NCDC manage-ment she thanked everyone for their participation.

She said it was a successful program with the aim of having a systematic plan of reporting and monitoring.

“I appreciate your time and understanding and look forward to working with everyone in the future,” Ms Unagi said.

Mr Beiyo thanked the Policy Division for the opportunity of facilitating the workshop and challenged that participants put to good use what they have learnt.

He described the workshop as a success with active participa-tion by everyone through group discussions and presentations.

Some of the NCDC staff who attended Monitoring & Evaluation systems training.

COME AND SEE US TODAYHave you received your approvals?

Liquor Trading License? Building Approval?Regulatory Services Division - Level 2, New City Hall, Waigani Drive

TELEPHONE: 324 0700 I Email: [email protected]

Freeway: be safety-conscious!NATIONAl Capital District Com-mission is strongly appealing to motorists and pedestrians to take extra care of their safety along the Poreporena Freeway as it under-goes a major rehabilitation.

Deputy City Manager Kenneth Atasoa made the strong appeal following cases of near accidents on sections of the freeway where work is currently undertaken.

“Firstly, let me apologise to the travelling public on behalf of the NCDC Board and management for any inconvenience the roadworks may be causing at this time. I wish to also appeal to everyone for patience and understanding as work progresses.”

“More importantly, I call on the travelling public using the Pore-porena Freeway to take every care possible as work on upgrad-ing the freeway progresses,” Mr Atasoa emphasised.

The Acting City Manager stressed the important require-

ments of safety for everyone in such big projects. NCDC and the contractor have made safety a priority knowing the impact the upgrading work will have on the daily routine of the public.

“We all need to take every care necessary in this circumstance.”

“I urge everyone moving around in the project area - either driving or walking - to observe all relevant signage installed and to be mindful that the use of the freeway at this time is restricted due to the upgrading work.”

“I seek everyone’s co-operation at this time,” Mr Atasoa said.

The public was informed on the closure of the freeway due to the rehabilitation program and the usual public safety expectations through a newspaper advertise-ment placed last month.

The notice mentioned the re- arrangement of the freeway to accommodate the work progress currently underway simultane-

ously at two to three different locations. This is expected to in-crease to five to seven locations when work intensifies.

The rehabilitation work is ex-pected to be completed by end of October 2018.

“Safety for everyone is impor-tant as work progresses and I strongly urge everyone to ob-serve this need while traveling through the affected areas of the freeway,” Mr Atasoa elaborated.

The upgrading work on the Poreporena Freeway is a K110 million Chinese government aid project to the Government and the people of Papua New Guin-ea as part of its contribution towards PNG’s preparation for APEC. The assistance includes the construction of a six lane boule-vard linking Waigani Drive and Parliament House.

Work in progress at Hohola’s Burns Peak Hill along the Poreporena Freeway in preparations for 2018 APEC Summit. THE good health of its custom-ers will remain a priority for City Pharmacy limited in accordance with the requirements of the NCDC Health Sanitation Act.

This priority was made known, when CPl organised Food Safety Training for all staff involved with food preparations. The training was conducted with the help of the NCDC Health Inspection team for staff employed in the butchery, bakery and kaibar sections.

The NCDC Health Sanitation Act among other things emphasises proper food handling and food processing standards with focus on maintaining health standards. The training covered areas on Food Hygiene, Personal Hygiene, Cleaning and Sanitizing, Food Stor-age and Transportation, Waste Management, Vector Control, Food Regulation/laws and Food Quality Management.

CPl Group Safety Manager Chester Selibu said the good health of everyone is a must and this is what CPl wants to stress to its employees to uphold at all times in the process of serving the public.

“It is essential therefore that all business houses are fully aware

of the requirements of the regula-tions in the best interest of every-ones health,” Chester said.

NCDC Senior Health Inspector Clivan Naha said CPl has set a benchmark for everyone to follow in the city especially when it comes to the health of the people.

“All the requirements are clearly stated in the relevant Acts, By laws and regulations of the Commis-sion and it is important everyone makes it their business to know and understand the requirements and put it into practise.”

“Both government and indus-tries have the responsibility to make sure the welfare and inter-est of the public are protected,” he said.

He urged participants to take ownership of the training and adapt to the changes that have been clarified.

NCDC Health Inspection team called on all business houses or groups involved in food processing and handling operations to contact the NCDC Health Inspection team at City Hall for any assistance they may require in line with their op-erations and the NCDC Health San-itation Act.

Upholding health standards



ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018 CAPACiTY BUiLDiNG | SIVARAI 7

CONCENTRATE in what-ever you want to do and you will achieve it, says Manager for the NCDC Business Arm,

Gabi Lega.He says if one has his or her

mind focusing in all directions, that particular person would not get anywhere in life.

“life is only one so stick to what you are good at doing and prosper there,” he says.

This was lega’s motto which he lived by to achieve his education and professional career.

As well, with that motto he man-aged to complete a course in the Masters of leadership in Business Administration (MLBA) - graduat-ing from the Divine Word Univer-sity on Sunday MAy11, 2018.

lega wanted to upgrade his qualifications and to be of contin-uous value to the National Capital District Commission. And so he applied and studied for the course from 2015 to 2017.

Part of the university’s flexible learning program, the course is made up of four semesters of three weeks residential each at the main campus where the student attends lectures, gets take-home assign-ments and submits them online, consisting of 12 subjects including research.

“Part of the reason for taking the course is to broaden my knowl-edge in executive management. You can take the organisation or your job as far as your qualification can take you. I did not want to be left out. In an ever changing world

you have to grow with times,” says lega adding the course was offer-ing knowledge about business, or-ganisation and management in his level and he needed to speak the language of business.

lega says the advantage of un-dertaking the course has given him the necessary skills that he will use to help and guide the management on the objectives of the Commission in terms of advice of leadership.

Recalling the challenges of working and studying for the course, he recalled almost blowing his chances.

He was fighting an illness as well as work related issues and al-most gave up.

“I was thinking of deferring it but managed anyway, thanks to the Grace of God. It was very stressful but I would encourage myself not to give away my life time opportu-nity. I have no regrets.”

lega now enjoys a great feeling of satisfaction and fulfilment from the realisation of the fact that his hard work has been rewarded and he has overcome his circumstanc-es to be there for the occasion on his graduation day.

“I cannot thank NCDC enough. I feel a sense of debt to the Commis-

sion. NCDC is a great organisation contributing to nation building in this way,” he says.

lega was raised by subsistence parents originally from Tauruba village in Rigo in Central province.

He says that part of his motiva-tion to do well in life was remem-bering the challenges his parents had to go through in selling their produce at the market to pay for him and his five other siblings’ school fees.

“Their unwavering devotion and faith in God saw us through our difficulties.”

During his school days, he man-aged to go as far as graduating from a technical college in 1995 due to an illness however, he never gave up his dream of one day hav-ing a university qualification.

After several jobs with other organisations he eventually joined the NCDC in 1996 with the HR di-vision.

He worked his way up from fil-ing clerk and 13 years later was the Human Resource Manager. A few years later and he has been moved to head the Business Arm office.

Throughout those years, he achieved his dream graduating from Institute of Public Admin-

istration with a Diploma in HRD (1999), Bachelor of Business Man-agement (professional studies) at UPNG (2005-2006) and the recent one being MlBA.

lega was not alone during his graduation, he was accompanied by his other colleague Silas Johna-than from NCDC Health Division.

Johnathan is a Senior Environ-mental Health Officer who under-took a similar flexible learning program from the DWU but stud-ied the Bachelor of Management.

The course was undertaken for a duration of two years from 2016 and 2017 over four semesters.

“During the course of my stud-ies, I have worked very hard with many sleepless nights and even on the weekends in order to ac-complish the assessment tasks on time,” recalls Johnathan.

He adds it was a tough experi-ence as he juggled through work commitment, studies and family obligations at the same time.

“However, I am now proud that with the strong determina-tion and courage, I managed to successfully complete the course with good results and was eligible for the graduation.”

He thanked the NCDC particu-larly the Human Resource Divi-

sion for the support given to com-plete the course.

He says the course was very rel-evant to his current position and would enhance his personal and professional capacity to higher level.

The lad from Piribu village in Tari Urban local level Govern-ment in Hela province also has a Diploma in Environmental Health Science certificate from DWU which he attained in 2002.

He joined the NCDC in 2005 as a Ward (junior) Environmen-tal Health Officer with Moresby North East electorate.

He says since the city is growing rapidly, there are also controlled and uncontrolled developments taking place thus increasing is-sues of public and environmental health - the division is facing a mammoth task in attending to the issues on a daily basis.

He says despite the challenges in his career, he has a good team of staff who work with him to serve the Commission’s goals and given the attainment of this bach-elor’s degree in management, it will enhance his career to better serve the Commission well.

Apart from thanking the Commission for their achieve-ments, both Johnathan and lega thanked their families and the Creator for the successful completion of their studies and pledged to work harder to serve the Commission.

I cannot thank NCDC enough. I feel a sense of debt to the Commission. NCDC is a great organisation contributing to nation building in this way.

- NCDC Business Arm Manager - Gabi Lega


Manager for the NCDC Business Arm Gabi Lega and NCDC Health Division’s Senior Environmental Health Officer Silas Johnathan during their graduation at the Divine Word University (DWU) in Madang.

Hard work pays off for NCDC officers ...


AvoID PRoCEssED JuNK FooD: (Eat Real Food Instead) Processed junk foods in our diet is the biggest reason the world is fat-ter and sicker than ever before. These foods have been engineered to be “hyper-rewarding.” They trick our brains into eating more than we need - even leading to addiction in some people. They are also low in fiber, protein and micronutrients (empty calories), but high in unhealthy ingredients like added sugar and refined grains.

HEALTH TIPSSimple

The vision of Walk and Yoga for life is to provide a fun, safe and healthy living using non-competitive sport for all residents of NCD! Together we

can develop a healthier, cleaner and a safer Port Moresby

Come and walk with NCD GoverNor HoN. PoWes ParKoP Every Sunday morning from 5:00am - 7:00am

WalK & YoGa For liFeCome join us every Sunday morning from 5:00 - 7:00 am, Murray Barracks Oval to Paga Hill Ring Road... ALL WELCOME !

COMMUNITY YOGA CLASS AT Fillipino Association Gym (FAPNG) EVERY SATURDAY START-ING @ 9:30 AM. FREE ADMISSION AND ALL ARE WELCOME!

The Walk & Yoga for Life program involve n o n - c o m p e t i t i v e physical activities that have attracted city

residents from all walks of life to unite, walk, and do yoga for their own heath fitness and wellbeing.

It has been four years since our city residents have been walking with the NCD Governor Powes Parkop from Jack Pidik and Murray Barracks to Ela Beach every Sun-day from 3am.

Governor Parkop thanked the city residents for their commit-ment every Sunday morning to join him in the walk.

“We have to walk together for our own health, fitness and wellness and most importantly to help us in changing our behaviour. It helps us come together as a city and com-munity. It helps us take ownership of our health, fitness and wellness - and to take ownership of the city,” Governor Parkop said.

He told the walkers that while

walking together they are breaking down barriers and getting rid of divisions.

“labelling has gone and we are walking together as one people and one city,” said the Governor.

He pointed out that human be-ings have more in common than our differences.

Human beings have two legs, arms, eyes, ears. Humans eat, drink, and all want to have a better living, good life and better future, he said adding these are the things that bring humans together and are the foundation for a better future.

The Governor urged everyone to do away with negativities such as labelling and creating barriers as these have destroyed the city for the last 42 years.

He said for far too long the peo-ple have not respected the city and it was time this mentality is changed. People should start tak-ing ownership to respect and care for our city.

A series of activities through-

out this month will be organised to shine light on these negative behaviours and to encourage pos-itive social interactions between women and men, girls and boys in the streets, markets, bus stops and other public spaces.

“We have used it, spit on it, crim-inalised it, spoilt it and we expect it to give us an amazing life. When you do that to your city you won’t get a good life,” he added.

“Now we have to build a better city, create a new normal where we are as one people, one city, one future. This is what our program is all about.”

Governor Parkop explained that

when something is working, suc-cessful, and making impact that is when resistance comes in to place.

“Resistance shows that we are successful, we are achieving our goals so don’t be moved by this,” Governor Parkop stressed.

“I will stand strong with no sec-ond step. I will go forward because this program has impact, it has mobilised you all here,” he said.

The Walk and Yoga for life pro-gram has successfully reached out to more than 5000 people.

“I haven’t paid you nor forced you to come and walk with me. You have joined me at your own will and that is the testament of

this program,” Governor Parkop said.

Say if you want to get to Hagen, you have to get on a plane, either Air Niugini or PNG Air, your goal is to get to Hagen. Also if you want to drink tea, sometimes it doesn’t matter what cup you use, plastic, big or small but as long as you drink the tea. Same as our pro-gram, we walk, do yoga, and do acrobatic, dance, boxing and other programs to improve our health fitness and wellness,” said Gover-nor Parkop.

Uniting for a better city

www.facebook.com/YogaForLifePNG

Port Moresby is the only city in the world that walks every Sunday morning. Governor Powes Parkop leads the way from Murray Barracks to Paga Hill ring road.


#WYFL Tribe

I am enjoying walking and I realise that there is no need to go through a hectic heavy physical and mental training schedule to transform or lose weight. Just simple walking and yoga, topped up with a little bit of nutritional change will make a huge difference.

Former Rugby League Player Wilfred Mai

ITS four o’clock in the morning in Port Moresby as the crowd of en-thusiastic walkers assemble from all parts of the city at the Papua New Guinea Defence Force Murray Barracks oval.

The number increases by the minute and soon the crowd is on the road towards the Hohola Un-derpass enroute to the Poreporena Freeway to the finishing location at the Paga Hill Ring Road.

Depending on how one treats the early morning walk, the paces dif-fer, the styles differ and the finish-ing times differ but the fact remains the blood is kept pumping in circu-lation in the body as everyone is in motion.

The whole intention of the walk is for health reasons as was the ini-tiative and vision of the NCD Gover-nor, Powes Parkop when he started the walk program in 2014.

Governor Parkop was compelled to introduce the program as he was increasingly worried about the health of city residents brought on by their changing lifestyle.

People dying young and lacking fitness was the Governor’s major concern and so he began walking to drive the message that keeping fit and healthy was important in this modern era where western life style was influential.

The numbers grew each Sunday and then almost everyone in the city realised its importance and started walking for their lives. If it was not with Governor Parkop on a Sunday, it was on any other day of the week but people started walk-ing.

“It’s a life changing experience” says regular walker Wilfred Mai.

Mai reflected on the Walk For life program and the changes it is

bringing about in him and in the city as a whole.

“City residents are coming out in numbers week in and week out every Sunday to walk for their health and wellness. Weekly com-munity walks are also on the in-crease and this is a clear indica-tion that people are serious about change,” he recollected.

Born on October 20, 1966, Mr Mai at one stage in his life, was nev-er conscious of his own health. He lived recklessly, eating and drinking whatever he could without care.

He knows well about health and fitness as a rugby league player - and a very good one at that - but the commitment in him started dwindling when he left the rugby league oval. His fitness dropped to a point of concern and any thought of recovering was far off his mind.

The fact that he was going to start all over again made him give up more and he didn’t know where to start.

“Then I started walking with Governor Parkop every Sunday,” Mai elaborated.

Captivated by the importance of life, 51 years old Wilfred Mai will keep on walking “...and I want everyone to take life seriously and start walking.”

“I am enjoying walking and I realise that there is no need to go through a hectic heavy physical and mental training schedule to trans-form or lose weight.

“Just simple walking and yoga, topped up with a little bit of nu-tritional change will make a huge difference.

“If it’s not with Governor Parkop, do it at your own time and pace but let’s walk.

“We all need to be conscious of

our well-being,” he said.Mai adds Yoga For life to the mix

and the benefits are endless from his experience. He was particular about positive mental development involved with Yoga for behavioural change and healthy living and the expectations on the positive turn arounds in the city in the long run.

Another committed walker NCDC Commissioner Kesley Mune has also realised just how impor-tant this program has become to him.

“leave the talking and live by walking,” said Mr Mune. “It’s our body, our city and our life. We deserve to feel safe, reclaim the streets and join the WYFl tribe for a safer, healthier and cleaner city,” he added.

And as Governor Parkop always reiterates every Sunday, “This morning in amazing Port Mores-by. One city of a thousand tribes come together as one people, one city, one country. We are unique, diverse and united so please join us every Sunday at 5.30 am from Mur-ray Barracks to Ela Beach. The walk that is the talk of town. let’s re-claim our future. live long, healthy, safe, clean and be happy”.

WyFL Coordinator Elizabeth Vi-viso is also amazed at the turn out every Sunday and believes it is at-tracting more and more interest every week.

“We are all one team and let us all continue to work together to make this happen for our health, wellness and fitness. We must also always bear in mind that we are the agents of change and let us start changing our communities,” said Viviso.

let’s walk ...Former rugby league star talks on his way to regaining his fitness

Anyone can do Yoga just like amputee Odi Hubert a regular yoga students.

Walk & Yoga For Life regular member George Mulungu doing the tree-stem. Wilfred Mai leading the pack during last Sunday on their way to Paga Hill Ring Road.

www.facebook.com/YogaForLifePNG


Standing magnificently at Wai-gani along the Somare Circuit in stylish architecture portray-ing a glimpse of Papua New Guinea’s traditional design of a

Haus Tambaran, the International Con-vention Centre adds to Port Moresby’s increasing facilities of global stand-ards.

The new venue infrastructure beautiful-ly adorned and fitted out in the most mod-ern and sophisticated equipment boasts class and magnificence aptly described by the Minister for National Planning and Monitoring, Richard Maru as a world class facility to market Papua New Guinea inter-nationally.

And as the keys to this magnificent building were formally handed over to Prime Minister Peter O’Neill by China’s Ambassador to PNG, Mr Xue Bing, Pap-ua New Guinea’s capability to host major events emphasised the statement... yES! We are capable of hosting major events of global and regional significance.

APEC 2018 is the talk of the town and such facilities will surely pave the way for international confidence in a young devel-oping nation called Papua New Guinea.

“Our main focus in APEC 2018 is all about accessing the international digital economy. We will promote free trade and investment in PNG,” says Prime Minister Peter O’Neill.

The confidence and support of the Gov-ernment and the people of the Republic of China is clearly demonstrated in this most modern international convention centre which is from the benefits of Chinese Aid to Papua New Guinea.

A further two major road projects were announced at the opening of the conven-tion centre by Mr O’Neill which will be un-dertaken concurrently to assist PNG in its preparations for APEC.

The projects worth K110 million in as-sistance include the rehabilitation of the Poreporena Freeway and the construction of a new world class six lane road known

as the Independence Boulevard linking Waigani Drive and Parliament House.

The projects will add immensely to the notion of Port Moresby as a liveable cap-ital city - convenient and conducive to the requirements of a modern capital city.

“When completed, these projects will positively improve the traffic conditions in Port Moresby, bring more convenience for city commuters and provide better envi-ronment and venues for different kinds of conferences and meetings,” said the Prime Minister.

For China, the aid is a demonstration of its strong confidence and support of Pap-ua New Guinea to host a unique and suc-cessful APEC meeting in Port Moresby in November.

Ambassador Xue Bing reaffirmed his country’s strong bond with Papua New Guinea which remains positive to this day.

“These completed infrastructure devel-opments will also showcase the progress and development of PNG before the other 20 APEC economies and after all, this what APEC is all about,” the Ambassador said.

City Governor Powes Parkop expressed overwhelming appreciation to the people and the government of the People’s Re-public of China with sentiments of the on-going Chinese assistance as a deepening of the existing friendship.

“We have built such good relations be-tween the two countries and the gifts of this new International Convention Centre and the launching of the two new APEC road projects is a great testament of this relationship. This is not the first time China has helped us, this is a long term prosperous relationship,” said Governor Parkop.

The Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) is a forum for 21 Pacific Rim mem-ber economies that promotes free trade throughout the Asia-Pacific region. It com-prises of 3000 representatives from the 21 economies namely Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, People’s Re-public of China, Hong Kong, China, Indo-

nesia, Japan, Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, The Russian Federation, Singapore, Chinese Taipei, Thailand, Unit-ed States of America and Vietnam.

It’s all positive progress towards hosting APEC 2018 says the Minister responsible for APEC, Justin Tkatchenko. And as prepa-rations of venues and other infrastructure progresses, Mr Tkatchenko said attention in all these developments is focused on convenience for everyone concerned.

To the Minister, and one whose vision-ary leadership for development in his Moresby South electorate is clearly visible, the massive infrastructure development in Port Moresby is timely and realises its val-ues in importance for a high-level meeting of influential world leaders.

This vision is shared by Prime Min-ister O’Neill who best summed up the

development scenario in relation to the importance of hosting APEC 2018. “This government’s work over the last five years in office must be complimented as it has brought focus that allows us to capitalize on infrastructure development, to capi-talize on an educated population, and to capitalize on a healthy population. This can give us enormous scope for more ac-celerated development in our economy. APEC 2018 is an important turning point for PNG,” he said.

He said that apart from the infrastruc-ture developments, the 2018 APEC meet in Port Moresby will also introduce new joint initiatives to empower our people to tap in to digital breakthroughs and the opportunities for better jobs, wages and quality of life they can provide.

ISSUE 79 | MAY 20182018 APEC SUMMiT | SIVARAI10


A city thriving for excellence in digital economy ...

Port Moresby on course for

APEC 2018 .... These completed infrastructure developments will also showcase the progress and development of PNG before the other 20 APEC economies... and after all, this what APEC is all about

- People’s Republic of China to PNG Ambassador Xue Bing

Minister For Lands & Physical Planning Justin Tkatchenko (centre) and guests at the official opening the new international Convention Centre.


ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018 2018 APEC SUMMiT | SIVARAI 11

What aPeC means to PNGPAPUA NEW GUINEA

takes up the role of hosting APEC meet-ings for the first time after 25 years of

membership (a quarter of cen-tury of its APEC membership.)

As hosts, Papua New Guineans will take leadership of the vari-ous meetings scheduled involv-ing senior officials of all APEC economies leading up to the much anticipated leaders’ sum-mit in November with focus on guiding the next steps in APEC to boost economic integration and trade, and equip workers and businesses of all sizes in all parts of the region, to confront profound changes underway in market competition, automation and skills demand.

Notable among those to lead discussions is Ivan Pomaleu as Papua New Guinea’s APEC am-bassador.

Pomaleu who is well versed in the business and economic sector will play a central role in advancing the region’s trade and growth agenda as the Chair of APEC Senior Officials meetings.

The focus according to Ambas-sador Pomaleu will be to tap into the digital technology for busi-ness and economic growth and for human development through innovation as key to opening av-enues to the next generation de-velopment and growth in Papua New Guinea and throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

“As our Prime Minister has highlighted, connecting people, in all areas, to new digital fron-tiers is key to realizing technol-ogy’s potential to deliver better job prospects and living stand-ards, and will be our laser focus in APEC as we move forward,” he said.

He added that officials will work to boost network access and connectivity, governance conditions and education and skills training among APEC econ-omies.

The aim is to enable more firms, including micro enterpris-es and startups, to participate in cross-border trade and supply chains as well as raise the em-ployment outlook and produc-tivity of the workforce in the dig-ital economy.

“They will also explore how technological inroads can be adapted to mitigate climate change and the higher frequency extreme weather that increas-ingly threatens lives and live-

lihoods in local communities all around the Pacific,” said Po-maleu.

Dr Alan Bollard, Executive Director of the APEC Secretar-iat believes that...“APEC econo-mies continue to make strides supported by advancements in market integration and digital development that are conducive to trade and growth.”

“We will seek to take next steps in APEC during Papua New Guinea’s year as chair to equip people with the tools and com-petencies to compete as inno-vation kicks into overdrive. The sustainability and reach of new growth in the region will depend greatly on the success of our ef-forts to empower people with digital skillsets,” Dr Bollard em-phasised.

Its all about people and devel-opment in this modern era says Prime Minister Peter O’Neill who stressed on the importance of better understanding the cur-rent global trends.

He explained that “all APEC economies must be inclusive and not leave people behind in a changing world.”

But the real concern in many communities around the region is the perception that globaliza-

tion brings a lot of negatives.“APEC needs to keep building

a bridge to ensure that people, both in developed and develop-ing economies, are empowered to take advantage of the posi-tives of globalization, so they can be a part of positive change and build better lives for their fami-lies,” Mr O’Neill elaborated.

Papua New Guinea is home to more than 8 million people and a gateway to the Pacific islands. The economy is significantly ag-riculture, fisheries, mining and liquefied natural gas producer, and will host APEC for the first time since becoming an APEC member a quarter century ago. Its per capita GDP has more than doubled over that span.

Enabling infrastructure devel-opment, digitally driven trade and reforms in education, train-ing and social safety nets will be among the policy issues on the table. The aim is to improve busi-ness conditions, job prospects and wages needed to foster in-clusive and sustainable growth.

On that basis, the Prime Min-ister is wary of the Papua New Guinea situation. “As an emerg-ing economy, we are coming out of a very traditional society into a modern economy in a space of

one generation, which gives us great challenges and also oppor-tunity.”

“Our aim is to build the tech-nology infrastructure that will give people the opportunity to participate in the global market, through employment and busi-ness opportunities.”

“We all live in a global commu-nity that is changing very fast. No country can do it alone. We must engage through APEC and other important regional and global forums,” said the Prime Minister.

And it’s no easy task hosting APEC says Dr. Bollard.

“APEC is trying to integrate

the Asia-Pacific region econom-ically by cutting trade barriers and keeping the spirit of trade, investments, people movement and economic integration alive.”

By hosting APEC Papua New Guinea will get a lot of expo-sure internationally from people that didn’t know much about the country. People will better understand the sorts of trade, tourism and investment oppor-tunities that exist here,” he said.

PNG will be able to showcase its culture, people, beauty, econ-omy and opportunities to the world as the Asia Pacific region assembles in Port Moresby.

As the host city, Port Moresby will take leaderships of the various meetings scheduled involving senior officials of all APEC economies leading up to November.

APEC needs to keep building a bridge to ensure that people, both in developed and developing economies, are empowered to take advantage of the positives of globalization, so they can be a part of positive change and build better lives for their families.

- Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Peter O’Neill


Infrastructure improve-ments in our city of Port Moresby has resulted in our residents taking a strong sense of ownership.

Residents have been playing their roles in maintaining the city’s cleanliness through the NCD Gov-ernor’s Volunteer Clean-Up pro-gramme to compliment the good work of PNG Gardener.

The city is looking much cleaner and better now in the last couple of months partly due to the rain and mostly the improved services of PNG Gardener.

The new roads and roundabouts starting at Seven Mile, Jackson’s International Airport all the way to Gerehu are cleaner and beautiful giving a whole new feel to our city.

PNG Gardener cleaners and con-tractors have done a tremendous job in keeping our city clean and beautiful up to now.

Every morning you can see the PNG Gardeners cleaners cleaning the median strips of our city roads.

The Communities within the city through the NCD Governor’s Volunteer Clean-up are also play-ing their roles in maintaining the cleanliness of our city.

Every once a week, city residents especially women and girls armed with rakes and spades clean their suburbs and neighbourhood.

This is part of their effort in helping to enhance the quality of life of our people in the com-munities.

And one of the volunteer cleaning groups is the Kou-ra Women & Girls made up of women from Tokarara/June Valley area of Ward Eight.

Every Tuesday mornings these

women and girls take time-out voluntarily to clean the roadside, median strips and roundabouts of the newly constructed Koura Way road since 2016.

“We believe in keeping the envi-ronment in our suburbs and com-munities cleaner, healthier and safer in order to give us a chance to live positive lives,” said Koura Way Women & Girls team leader Cecile Kerage.

And with the 2018 Asia Pacif-ic Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit to be held from November 12-18, having a cleaner and beau-tiful city will give a good impres-sion to the global leaders and their delegates who will be attending the meeting according to Mrs Ker-age.

Mrs Kerage said cleanliness of our communities, streets and suburbs of our city is everyone’s responsibility.

NCD Governor Powes Parkop hopes that the actions of these vol-unteer cleaning groups will forbid others to litter and stop the end-less rubbish throwing around the streets.

“This is an example of the Active City model where we take our ef-forts back into the community and support the communities them-selves to find solutions of what will work best in their own homes, streets, suburbs and together we will create that healthy, safe and clean city if we continue this trend of awakening and transformation of our people, especially our grass-roots community,” said the Gover-nor.

The citywide volunteer cleaning programme was initiated in 2016 as part of the Walk & Yoga For life

healthy lifestyle initiative under the Global Active City Develop-ment Project.

The Global Active City Devel-opment Project is led by TAFISA (The Association for International Sport for All) and Evaleo, an NGO specialising in development and the promotion of well-being and sustainable health.

It aims to establish a labelling and certification scheme based on an ISO-compatible standard, thus accrediting Active Cities that are doing a wondrous job worldwide.

PNG Gardener General Man-ager Jacque Ware said cleaning and beautification of the city is an ongoing programme for PNG Gar-dener.

PNG Gardener is always ready to partner NCDC to help keep our city clean and beautiful.

Some of the beautification pro-gramme carried out by PNG Gar-dener in our city include Waigani Drive, Wards Road and the new Ela Beach.

“We are also improving all the roundabouts in our city by plant-ing new plants changing the face of Port Moresby into a cleaner, healthier and safer city,” said Ms Ware.

The streets are much cleaner with the street cleaners constantly doing their job every morning.

They have started doing the beautification of the newly con-structed Ela Beach road in planting and landscaping.

“We are trying our best to en-sure the city is cleaner leading up towards the 2018 APEC Summit.

“Our staffs are working tireless-ly to ensure that our city is cleaner and beautiful.

ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018YUMi KLiNiM MOSBi| SIVARAI12

Read more: www.sivarai.ncdc.gov.pg Follow us on facebook Email: [email protected]

A clean city is a happy city

We’re building the best city in the Pacific Hon. Powes Parkop, LLB, LLM, MP

Governor, National Capital District

Yumi Klinim MosbiKEEP PORT MORESBY CLEANER, HEALTHIER AND SAFER

Clean City, positive outlookKoura Women & Girls Volunteer Cleaning group of Tokarara/June Vallay armed with their rakes and spades relaxing after a Tuesday morning clean-up along the new Koura Way road.

PNG Gardener cleaner cleaning the roadside along the Waigani Drive.

PNG Gardener cleaner cleaning North Waigani Bus Stop.


society.“The involvement of inmates

through music is to capture the attention of the young people out there to refrain and live a pur-poseful life on a path to building a better society for today and for our future generations of this country,” Totil said.

This awareness album will be officially launched on May 10 2018 and will be fully funded by the Office of the Minister for Youth, Religion and Community Development.

Totil said a total of ten songs were composed. The female in-mates composed two Songs on drugs, Titled “Say No to Drugs” and “Tingim Gud Pastaim”. The main compound inmates com-posed four songs on alcohol, ti-tled “Taim Yu Drin Bia”, “Higher than a liar”, “Aids” and “Toksave”.

Maximum Security Units in-mates composed three Songs titled “Yumi lukautim Mosbi”

and “Child Abuse” and “Violence against Women” while the juve-nile inmates composed a song titled “Marijuana”.

The programs seek to instill in the youths a realisation of their importance in society.

Schools are now involved in the programs to prepare stu-dents on the challenges in life ahead. An NCD Secondary School Captain’s Charter Meet and Greet was organised involving twenty secondary schools. The school captains and their principals met to gauge their views on issues af-fecting them in life.

Awareness is strongly em-phasised in these issues at the schools involving Juvenile in-mates who gave testimonies and about their time in prison.

NCDC through YlM is embrac-ing the partnership of all stake-holders relevant to the anti-so-cial issues and utilising relevant resources in the coordination of

its programs on Youth Agents Of behavioural Change (yABC) leadership Trainings, Drug Awareness in Secondary Schools, Drug and Alcohol Training with juveniles, NCD Secondary School Charter Meet and Greet and many others.

The various programs have created many opportunities for the illiterate, unfortunate, drop outs and even the imprisoned youths.

And as Governor Parkop al-ways says, “there is always hope for the future regardless of cir-cumstances.

“The sky is the limit and to-gether with good and innovative leadership and management, the opportunities will present them-selves to provide the youth of NCD a hope for a brighter future.”

In the midst of all the de-velopment that is taking place in Port Moresby, human resource devel-opment stands out as

among the benefits to the city residents.

City residents from all walks of life especially the youth and the under privileged have benefitted in one way or the other from the many training initiatives and op-portunities provided by the NCD Governor Powes Parkop.

The training programs range from short term training with the Urban youth Employment Pro-gram enabling them to gain pos-itive life skills to find part time employment to long term Tech-nical Vocational Education Train-ing (TVET ) training and then the community oriented activities in-volving sports including the Walk and Yoga for life program.

In partnership with Ginigoada, NCDC through the Yumi lukau-tim Mosbi (yLM) program has provided short skills training and extended this to the prisons involving the inmates.

All these activities and pro-grams according to the NCD Gov-ernor are aimed at giving a sec-ond chance in life for those who have been displaced by the sys-tem or by the hard economic sit-

uation everyone is experiencing.Governor Parkop explained

that the whole purpose of the programs is to provide a pathway for young people to change.

In recent times NCDC YlM has been working with the inmates at the Bomana Prison to provide a pathway for transformation, even whilst behind bars.

Through the program, thirty inmates were given the oppor-tunity to showcase their musical talent of composing music and singing. NCDC was partnered by Chin H Meen, the National Youth Development Authority (NyDA), Department of Commu-nity Development and Religion and Correctional Services in this program.

YlM Coordinator lucy Totil highlighted that the overall goal is to create a better Port Moresby through its programs and pro-mote the good work of the NCD Governor.

Totil said recently in view of escalating abuse of homebrew, drugs and alcohol resulting in gender violence and lawlessness, the inmates who were involved with these substances were en-couraged to apply their personal experience and the dangers of the abusive use of the substances through music as deterrence in


Creating opportunities ...Some of the 30 inmates who are given the opportunity to showcase their talent of composing music and singing.

Report your complaints or concerns on:WASTE COLLECTIONMr. Simeon TerinaWaste ManagerPhone: 323 4491 Fax: 323 1182Email: [email protected]

HEALTH ISSUESMr. Isowa MoreChief Health SurveyorPhone: 325 4711 Ext. 226Email: [email protected]

ROADS & CIVIL ENGINEERINGMr. Simon VaiDeputy City ManagerPhone: 324 0522 Fax: 325 6956Email: [email protected]

ROADS & CIVIL WORKSMr. Joe OapaisaWorks ManagerPhone: 324 0543 Fax: 325 6956Email: [email protected]

CITY REGULATION & CONTROLMr. Kenneth AtasoaDeputy City Manager - RegulatoryPhone: 325 4711 Fax: 323 1182Email: [email protected]

COMMUNITY & SOCIAL SERVICESMr. Lulu TedDeputy City ManagerPhone: 324 0708 Fax: 323 1182Email: [email protected]

YOUTH, WOMEN & SPORTSMr. Kila DickSocial Services ManagerPhone: 325 4711 Ext. 224 Fax: 3231182 Email: [email protected]

YUMI LUKAUTIM MOSBI PROJECTMs. Lucy TotilActing Co-ordinatorPhone: 323 3459 Fax: 323 1182Email: [email protected]

PUBLIC RELATIONSMr. Udu VaiManagerPhone: 324 0794 Fax: 323 0099Email: [email protected]

Or you can contact the City Manager Mr. Bernard Kipit directly on Tel: 324 0714/707, Fax: 325 9968, or Email: [email protected]

The involvement of inmates through music is to capture the attention of the young people out there to refrain and live a purposeful life on a path to building a better society for today and for our future young generations of this country

NCDC YLM Coordinator Lucy Totil

ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018 YUMi LUKAUTiM MOSBi | SIVARAI 13


The shrill call of Edioro ooooo! will ring out once more in Septem-ber as the Hiri Laga-toi will gracefully sail

down to the shore in replica of the days when the lagatoi would return from a successful Hiri voyage from the west.

In those days, there was feasting and celebration for the successful return of the men who had spent months and months away from home to relieved and happy fam-ilies in particular the womenfolk who were subjected to strict rituals of the hiri practices for a successful trade and safe voyage by the men.

Port Moresby celebrates these famous trade expeditions in a big way through the Hiri Moale Festi-val dubbed as the premier cultural event of Port Moresby.

At the official launching of the 2018 Hiri Moale Festival, the Chairman of the Hiri Moale Festival Committee and Acting Chairman of the Motu Koita Assembly, Opao

Udia, laid down the expectation on the festival and made it very clear that the Hiri Moale Festival must live up to that expectation as the premier cultural event of Port Moresby.

Mr Udia made it clear that the festival was not just another cul-tural festival but one that depicts the livelihood of the Motu and Koit-abu people.

“The Hiri Moale Festival is a cel-ebration of the successful trading expeditions our ancestors under-took with the people of Kerema and whose return ensued survival of our people throughout the en-tire drought that would have oth-erwise brought great misery.

“The Festival is a celebration of courage, determination, commit-ment, discipline and ultimately the friendships that were established and have lasted to this day. Our ancestors braved all difficulties to go on this often difficult expedi-tions thus, the staging of the Hiri Moale Festival as a mark of respect

and honour for their goodwill,” Mr. Udia said.

As the diversity of Port Moresby grows with the rapid development of the city, the indigenous land-owners of the city feel marginal-ised to an extent. The issues and others culminate as concerns for the existence of Motu and Koitabu people in the city and any means to recognise their existence is impor-tantly needed.

This aspect of the Hiri Moale Festival and its relevance to the status quo of the Motu and Koitabu people was clearly expressed by the Festival Chairman.

“ ….. we, the Motu and Koitabu people need the Hiri Moale Festi-val to remind us of our origins, our identity and more importantly our standing in this wonderful city of ours as the indigenous landowners of Port Moresby.

“We need to be recognised ac-cordingly and the Hiri Moale Festi-val is capable of portraying our ex-istence that is sadly eroding on so many fronts,” Mr Udia emphasised.

Hiri Moale Festival 2018 will be extra significant this year coincid-ing with the all-important APEC meeting in Port Moresby. This is a golden opportunity to showcase the culture, traditions and histo-ry of the people to the rest of the world.

The festival is anticipated to live up to this expectation of the APEC opportunity and the colour and glamour will be certainly on show for the world to see.

The September 14 – 15 event will re live the Hiri trade and prom-inently featured will be lagatois (huge dug out traditional vessels), the hanenamos (young women) in full traditional regalia and a col-ourful display of traditional danc-ing, singing and festivity in a grand promotion of the Hiri trade, its cul-tures and traditions.

The festival brings the entire Port Moresby city together in one location in a demonstration of uni-ty in diversity.

City Manager Bernard Kipit committed the ongoing support of the NCDC towards the festival in recognition of the need to main-tain culture and traditions in this modern time and in particular for the Motu and Koitabu people and their existence in the city.

ISSUE 79 | MAY 20182018 HiRi MOALE FESTiVAL| SIVARAI14

Last year’s Hiri Hanenamo contestants.

Port Moresby’s premier cultural festival

The Festival is a celebration of courage, determination, commitment, discipline and ultimately the friendships that were established and have lasted to this day.

Acting Chairman of MKA Opao Udia


SIX Nations including Papua New Guinea (PNG) have competed in the Oceania Hockey Olympic Qual-ifier in Port Moresby.

The best hockey talent in the Oceania region was in display here in Port Moresby from April 23-28 2018.

City Manager Bernard Kipit wel-comed every single player, officials and everyone in the city involved in the exciting sporting event - the Oceania under 18, youth Olympic qualifier.

Kipit in his welcome speech dur-ing the official opening thanked the PNG Hockey Federation for staging this event in our city and further extended his appreciation to the International Hockey Federation for recognising the potentials of PNG to host an event successfully.

“The efforts of our international friends to come to our country and to our humble city is highly appre-ciated and is certainly a show of confidence in Papua New Guinea and for Port Moresby as the capital city,” Kipit said.

Kipit said Port Moresby is un-dergoing a massive transformation from infrastructure to service fa-cilities. “Port Moresby is equipped with the most modern standards to meet the demands of the world”,

“To add to this transformation, this hockey tournament will be played in facilities of international standard,” Kipit added.

He said Port Moresby rose to the occasion of hosting sport-ing events of global and regional

significance when it successfully hosted the Pacific Games, the Rug-by league World Cup matches and various other international sport-ing tournaments.

“Our support of the event as the municipal authority of the city is underpinned by the high val-ues that we get out of sports. It is

more as an obligation than a mere sponsor. We acknowledge the ex-ceptional efforts of our hockey officials to stage it here in the city, ”he said.

Kipit said without doubt the Oceania region were unified dur-ing the course of the tournament which was a successful event.

THE NCD Suburban Soccer league has successfully hosted the NCD Governor’s Cup and the Walk and Yoga for life Manager’s Cup during the Easter Period.

Tournament president Jerry In-iga said this is the first time they have run the Easter soccer games and it was a success.

Thirty-two teams who came from the three electorates includ-ing the Motu Koitabu took part in the tournament.

The games for both divisions ended with Original FC beating En-sisi United 2-1 in the male division and Nikints FC beating Bao Drifters 1-0 in the female division.

Iniga thanked the participating teams for their time and effort in tsking part in the tournament dur-ing the long Easter weekend.

“For me hosting these games is to allow the youths to stay out of trou-ble during the easter weekends,” said Iniga.

Iniga said most of these youths are not working and at times like this they join up with friends and

end up being victims of alcohol and drug related problems.

“That’s not what I want for the youths in NCD and that’s why I’m taking the responsibilities and with the support of our good Governor for NCD Powes Parkop I successful-ly ran this Easter Cup.”

Iniga and his community started their journey two years ago when they initiated the Morota Soccer league. A year later they moved further to hosting the NCD Subur-ban Soccer league and now they are hosting the yearly Easter Cup.

They will also include the junior clubs when they kick off the 2018-2019 NCD Suburban Soccer league in October.

“We believe that one day these youths and children will be repre-senting NCD and PNG in soccer and thats what we want to achieve,” said Iniga.

Iniga said NCD Suburban Soccer league is a new association that will soon work towards meeting the standards of the Port Moresby Soccer Association.

ISSUE 79 | MAY 2018 SPORT| SIVARAI 15

steven lifts PNG again!

THE Governor of National Cap-ital District Powes Parkop has extended huge congratulations on behalf of the NCDC Board, Management and staff to Steven Kari, for lifting our country of a one thousand tribes and 760 languages to the world stage and coming home with a Gold medal.

“He has done Papua New Guin-ea proud and I am so honoured as Governor of our city for this great achievement.

This is the reason why I em-phasize and give priority to sports - whether competitive or non-competitive - sport has the ability to lift, to break barriers, to unite people and nations and make somebody out of nobody to be a champion regardless of his colour, race, gender or religion.”

“We are building a gym at Sir Hubert Murray Stadium which will be available for weightlifting

clubs in the city’s Big Village. We have got the title to the stadium now and we are hoping the stadi-um will be completed before the end of the year,” said Governor Parkop.

“We have seen the passion and success of our people in Hanu-abada who have embraced this sports. They have developed champions for us and they de-serve all the support they need.

Kari, Dika Toua and Morea Baru were given a grand wel-come on their arrival back to Port Moresby.

Steven Kari successfully de-fended his Commonwealth Games title in the men’s 94 kilo-grams weightlifting event after breaking the clean and jerk Com-monwealth record at 2018 Com-monwealth Games in Gold Coast.

Steven Kari showing-off his gold medal upon his arrival at Jackson’s international Airport last month.

Ensisi United player trying to pass the Original FC backline defence.

A PNG hockey U-18 player looking for his support players during the tournament.

Oceania’s best hockey talent on show in NCD

Easter Cup a success



Port Moresby to host more qualifiers

Port Moresby to host more qualifiers

News from the National Capital District of Papua New Guinea www.sivarai.ncdc.gov.pg May 2018

sPort

IT was an honour for Port Moresby City to host another prestigious event – the first international Hockey 5’s Oceania U-18 Youth Olympic Qualifier.

The hosting of the international sporting event is the beginning of many more qualifiers to grace Papua New Guinea’s shores at junior level.

The government will continue to support such development says PNG Sports Foundation Chief Executive Officer Peter Tsamilli Jnr.

Tsamilli Jnr in his welcome speech during the official opening of the U18 tournament last week said the government has made so much investment into these sporting infrastructures and the PNGSF is pleased that these sort of events are finally grac-ing the country’s shores.

“We look forward to encouraging more sport-ing events of this calibre to be hosted here in Port Moresby,” he says.

Present during the official opening was Vice Sports Minister Wesley Raminai, Acting Deputy City Manager of the National Capital District Com-mission Isowa More, President PNG Hockey Feder-ation Kaluwin Potuan, Secretary General Oceania Hockey Federation Bob Claxton, Continental Devel-opment Oceania Hockey Federation Gill Gemming and Oceania Hockey Federation Intercontinental Development Officer Jennie Thompson.

Five teams comprising three men and two wom-en divisions will be representing the Oceania re-gion in hockey at the 2018 youth Olympics in Ar-gentina, Bueno’s Aires.

The countries initially confirmed to participate included Australia, Solomon Islands, Fiji, Vanuatu, Tonga and host PNG. Unfortunately Fiji and Tonga could not make it on time.

Claxton hopes that after the tournament the players can go back and tell their people that PNG is a great place to visit.

Claxton said PNG is one of the most beautiful places in the Pacific with lots of things to see so he hoped they took advantage of their stay in Port Moresby and enjoyed the tournament.

“Hockey 5s is a new format that has been only introduced in the last Olympic Games in Beijing, it’s exciting and probably will be the future,” said Claxton.

The sport of hockey is spreading to Pacific coun-tries like Fiji, Tonga, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea.

Vice Minister Raminai welcomed all the coun-tries to Port Moresby and commended the Oceania Hockey Federation for honouring their commit-ment.

He also told the visiting athletes that PNG was a great place to visit and hoped they enjoyed their stay during the tournament.

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