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PNG in the News
Adventure tourism in PNG -- http://www.stuff.co.nz/4825754a34.html
Nippon Oil farms into four PNG oil, gas fields -- http://giaman.com/pg/?2b062b
A blanket ban on the sale of betelnut in Port Moresby is not being enforced. Street sellers are still selling the nut in public -- http://www.rnzi.com/pages/news.php?op=read&id=44266sf
97 unclaimed bodies set for paupers burial -- http://giaman.com/pg/?48dbfb
Masta Mak Rangers dress up league clubs -- http://philippe-voiceofmelanesia-http://giaman.com/pg/?6977b8
PNG Blogs
Sam Basil, Morobe MP -- http://sambasil.blogspot.com/
Brooklyn Botanic Garden - Expedition: PNG -- http://bbg.org/blogs/expedition/?p=170
http://ittoktok.blogspot.com/2009/01/virgin-pacific-blue-forces-papua-new_15.html
How to win friends and influence people, PNG style: Gulf Province -- http://steveinpng.blogspot.com/2009/01/gulf-province.html
How to win friends and influence people, PNG style: Manus Province -- http://steveinpng.blogspot.com/2009/01/manus-province.html
How to win friends and influence people, PNG style: Gulf Province -- http://steveinpng.blogspot.com/2009/01/gulf-province.html
Not the Real Papua New Guinea!! -- http://walkertalkie.blogspot.com/2009/01/not-real-papua-new-guinea-01-16-09.html
Just another day at the office -- http://tubby-bear.blogspot.com/2009/01/just-another-day-at-office.html
Heidi's Happenings -- http://heidigraf.blogspot.com/2009/01/papua-new-guinea-photos.html
Lark Force -- http://australia-books.blogspot.com/2009/01/darkest-hour-true-story-of-lark-force.html
Kelly's 2009 PNG Trip -- http://kellypng2009.blogspot.com/2009/01/e-mail-update-2.html
A Medical Missionary: Another Week -- http://mcquaidpng.blogspot.com/2009/01/another-week.html
Cockroaches and Greens -- http://missionarymommy.wordpress.com/2009/01/22/kumu-6/
News Items
Hagen By-Election
The National Court has ordered a by-election for the Western Highlands provincial seat held by Tom Olga after declaring Mr Olga's 2007 election null and void.
see -- http://www.rnzi.com/pages/news.php?op=read&id=44312
Deputy Governor Benjamin Mul has been called upon to take the reigns as acting Governor to enable smooth delivery of services to the people. The holder of the provincial seat is also usually entitled to be the governor of the province. Mr Olga has insisted he is still the governor and has called on his supporters and the people to remain calm and respect the decision of the National Court.
Airport Robbery
A Supreme and National Court judge, who witnessed a recent robbery at the International airport at Seven-Mile in Port Moresby, has called the security arrangements at the airport "slack". He wants to know how come scruffy-looking people are allowed to enter (during the recent robbery) but they prevent decent people such as the judge and others from gaining access to the terminal. Criminals escaped with K57,000 in cash, most of it in kina, after robbing the foreign currency counter at the airport.
Victoria Cross
There are only 3 living holders of the Victoria Cross (VC) in Australia. The latest recipient Mark Donaldson joins two others still surviving, the 75 year old Keith Payne VC, and 89 year old Ted Kenna VC, who was awarded his VC for an action in 1945 at Wewak in what was then called New Guinea.
Edward (Ted) Kenna was born at Hamilton, Victoria, on 6 July 1919. On 15 May 1945, Kenna was involved in an action near Wewak, now Papua New Guinea, during which he exposed himself to heavy fire, killing a Japanese machine gun crew and making it possible for his company's attack to succeed. For this he was awarded the Victoria Cross. Three weeks later he was shot in the mouth and spent more than a year in hospital before being discharged from the AIF in December 1946.
see -- http://www.awm.gov.au/people/8271.asp
Special Care Nursery
Statistics show the PNG population has almost doubled since independence in 1975 yet the facilities at the Port Moresby General Hospital have virtually remained the same for the Special Care Nursery. The nursery at the hospital was built in the 1960s and is the only such unit in the National Capital District. The Rotary Club of Boroko renovated the nursery in 1972 but little has been done since then to improve the care available to the infants.
The infrastructure may be lacking state-of-the-art facilities and equipment but the nurses and doctors do all possible to ensure the well being of the critically ill babies. Unfortunately sick babies are often discharged to make way for even sicker babies.
The Rotaract Club is planning to build a new state of the art Special Care Nursery at the hospital and hopefully this will begin shortly so more infants can be saved.
see associated article on the PMGH -- http://www.thenational.com.pg/011609/nation2.php
see also -- http://www.postcourier.com.pg/20090123/news16.htm
Hospital Water Pump Stolen
The Kainantu hospital's White House clinic run by Save the Children has had an important water pump stolen. The clinic is part of the PNG-Australia sexual health improvement project and provides screening and treatment services to people from Watarais, Henganofi, Obura-Wonenara and Kainantu districts as part of a national intervention to prevent the transmission of HIV/AIDS by reducing sexually-transmitted infections in communities. The clinic has had to reduce activities until a replacement pump is installed.
Cabinet Change
Rumours have been rife that there will be a change in the make up of the cabinet ruling the country. The Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare has said a reshuffle in cabinet was his prerogative and he would make that announcement when he deemed it necessary.
see -- http://www.thenational.com.pg/011909/nation2.php
Looking for Tom Pringel
Daniel Dadamu is searching for a PNG friend. They studied together at Waigani Campus, UPNG in 1997-98. The friends name is Tom Pringel. Should anyone have information on his whereabouts please let Daniel know. He can be contacted using this email address: d_dadamu@yahoo.com. Thank you very much.
Rice
Not only has the price of fuel dropped the price of rice has now dropped by as much as 35 toea a kilogram. Trukai has given its major distributors and wholesalers an 8 per cent reduction in the price of Roots Rice and expects this to be passed on to the end user. Other Trukai brands will also be reduced by as much as 10 per cent.
Baha'i Gathering
A regional conference of 1500 participants recently in Lae made this the biggest gathering of Baha'is in PNG. The conference was one of 41 being held in cities around the world by the Baha'i. Read about the challenges of attending the conference -- http://news.bahai.org/story/689 -- in fact this story would be fairly typical for people attending any conference in PNG.
Amelia Earhart
There has been much printed about the disappearance of Amelia Earhart after leaving Lae on the 2nd of July, 1937. Much of it has been generated by an ex-Air Niugini engineer by the name of Dave Billings who has spent many years trying to find the elusive wreck.
see the latest here -- http://www.aerohub.co.nz/?p=632 -- and some of the other articles here -- http://giaman.com/pg/?757e0d -- http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2008/07/dayintech_0702 -- http://kellyisbetterthanmichelle.blogspot.com/2008/08/amelia-earhart.html -- http://giaman.com/pg/?297991
Aussie Rules Football
AFL PNG Profile -- http://afl.com.au/PapuaNewGuinea/tabid/10348/default.aspx
AFL PNG Web Site -- http://www.afl-png.com/
AFL PNG Main Teams
Port Moresby
Dockers
West's
University Bulldogs
Power
Crows
Lae
NGI Power
Eriku Swans
Lae Bulldogs
University Hawks
Kimbe
Kimbe Offspring
Kimbe Secondary
Town Crows
Town Dockers
Hoskin Tibiusu
The 2008 International Cup -- http://www.afl.com.au/About/tabid/12174/default.aspx -- was won by an 8 point margin by PNG.
PNG Orchids
The Orchid Society of PNG (OSPNG) has won another Gold Cup at a recent International Orchid Show held in China. OSPNG beat more than 49 orchid displayers from around the world to win this top award for the best display at the show. The president of OSPNG, Mr Justin Tkatchenko, thanked the continuous support from Air Niugini, the Nation's flag-carrier, for assistance with freighting the to China.
East Sepik Fuel
The fuel crisis previously reported here -- ../news/g090106.html#fs -- in the East Sepik province will hopefully be settled by the time this newsletter is received. The province has been without kerosene and petrol since last month while diesel has been selling on the black market for between K10 and K15 per litre. The province has been hard hit by fuel shortage following the recent sea swell in Wewak which caused damages to the port and made it impossible for tankers to berth and unload fuel products.
see also -- http://www.thenational.com.pg/012309/nation8.php
Fuel Surcharge
Air Niugini has been able to slash the fuel surcharge imposed on all tickets due to the drop in world oil prices. Passengers will now pay less. The current domestic fuel surcharge is K137 per sector and this will drop to K100 per sector. Most international sectors will see a drop in the surcharge. Currently passengers pay US$170 on international routes and this will drop to US$105. Air Niugini operates to 10 international destinations and 18 domestic routes.
Meanwhile Air Niugini has resumed flights into Tokua Airport, East New Britain province after a change in wind direction blew the volcanic ash away from the aerodrome.
PNG Web Hosting
Having a website has become a true necessity nowadays. Here you will find all the required website resources in one place - 24/7 web hosting services complemented with FREE bonuses such as popular PHP scripts, marketing tools and a website builder, among others. -- http://www.pngwebhost.com
Moresby Sea Park
The rehabilitation exercise currently underway by the National Capital District Commission at the old sea park site off Ela Beach in Port Moresby has received a boost of K300,000 from the National Fisheries Authority.
Potato Crop Threatened
Leading fresh vegetable supplier, Alele Farm Fresh Produce, has warned that the PNG potato crop faces a severe threat from imports from Australia. The new diseases have been identified as leaf roll virus, bacteria wilt, black lake and a new virus that the government has not yet identified. If introduced into new soil, the soil can become unproductive for up to 10 years and can not be controlled by the use of chemicals. The potato crop, worth about K100 million to the national economy, is a very important crop for PNG. It is an important cash crop for rural farmers.
Murder Capital
Port Moresby was recently ranked by the Washington DC-based Foreign Policy publication alongside Caracas (Venezuela), Cape Town (South Africa), New Orleans (USA) and Moscow (Russia) as cities where you have a very good chance of getting murdered. Port Moresby has a Murder rate of 54 per 100,000 (2004 official figure).
see -- http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4480
Aborted Landing
An Air Niugini Fokker F100 aircraft had to abort a landing at Lae's Nadzab airport recently when a cow was spotted grazing on airport land. Air Niugini's chief executive officer, Wasantha Kumarasiri, said he was not aware of the incident. He immediately called for a report on the matter from his staff.
NasFund Updates
NasFund members will soon be able to get the balance of their account using the mobile phone companies short messaging services (SMS). Members will need to register their mobile phone to benefit from the service.
Send Money Pacific
If you are in Australia or New Zealand and want to send money to Papua New Guinea (or Fiji, Kiribati, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu) then check out the Send Money Pacific web site. -- http://www.sendmoneypacific.org -- The site has been funded by AusAID with support from NZAID. It has information about buy/sell rates, service fees, transfer speeds, etc. Fill in the form and within seconds you will be able to compare which organisation will offer you the best rate and / or the fastest transmission of money to the countries mentioned.
Coming Events
Inaugural Madang Golf Classic February 2009 sponsored by Airlines of PNG.
Symposium on Sea Turtles - to be held in Brisbane, Australia between the 17th and 19th of February.
Oceania Snooker and Billiards titles in Port Moresby from the 20th to the 29th of March.
PNG Institute of Engineers national conference -- 2nd and 3rd of April.
34th Games Fishing Association PNG National Game Fishing Titles - Madang - from the 3rd of April to 13th of April - see -- http://giaman.com/pg/?b94786
PNG Kickboxing Association has postponed its world title fight -- 25th April.
ANZAC Day - 25th April
Arafura Games - 9 to 17th of May -- http://www.arafuragames.nt.gov.au/
The International Cricket Council (ICC) East Asia Pacific (EAP) Under 19 Cricket Trophy tournament will be held from the 1st to the 7th of June
5th National Tourism Conference -- June (date to be confirmed) - to be held at Madang Resort Hotel.
Tolai Warwagira from 8 to 14 July and Mask Festival from 15 to 18 July at Kokopo East New Britain
PNG Remembrance Day - 23rd July
45th Medical Symposium - Port Moresby - sponsored by the Pacific International Hospital from the 1st to the 5th of September.
31st October and the 1st of November - Morobe Show
National Elections - June 2012
Do you have an event that you want advertised? - use the submission form located at -- ../misc/ctc.html.
PNG Media
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