Papua New Guinean Treasurer Ian Ling-Stuckey has clarified that the miscellaneous item of K2.6 billion in the budget will be spent on settling superannuation payments for government employees, unpaid rental bills and final entitlements to retired public servants, among other expenses.

“The budget is broken up into many lines of expenditure,” he said.

One of these is Division 207, which refers to “miscellaneous” expenditure by the Treasury and Finance departments.

“Frankly, these are often pretty boring payments, dominated by required payments by government where the funding is centralised rather than given to individual agencies,” Ling-Stuckey said.

He was responding to the PNG Post-Courier’s editorial comment on the budget on Tuesday December 6, asking him to provide an explanation on the “whopping” K2.6 billion miscellaneous expenditure, which represented 10 percent of the total 2023 budget.

“We are no financial genius nor do we claim to be an expert in budget matters but one thing that sticks out and deserve comment from everyone, however has not drawn one single line from the Treasurer, Ian Ling-Stuckey, or the Shadow Treasurer, Douglas Tomuriesa and other experts around the country.

The editorial read in part:

“An amount of K2,561,000 million of the total 2023 budget has been parked under this expenditure head.

“This is more than the money allocated to education (K1,383 or 7 percent), Health (K2,335 or 10 percent), law and order (1,385 or 7 percent) and transport (K2,226 or 9 percent) – all key socioeconomic sectors in the country that took just under 10 percent of the budget respectively.

“There are no notes in the budget documents that detail the areas for the expenditure of the K2.5 billion, and the Treasurer, Ling-Stuckey, does not make mention of that money at all in his budget speech.

“We, however, understand that miscellaneous expenses are also costs to government that do not fall into a specific category but to put away a whopping 10 percent of the total budget is just too much and unacceptable.

“It is not too late to demand that the government, through the Treasurer, provide a detailed report on the miscellaneous cost in 2022 and the expenditure plan for the miscellaneous budget for 2023.”

Ling-Stuckey said: “Contrary to the Post-Courier’s allegations, the details for the K2561 million in “miscellaneous” expenditure is clearly set out in the budget.

“Over 10 pages of detail are provided in the budget documents — for the 2023 Budget, see pages starting at page 227 of Volume 2A, and page 236 in the same volume for 2022.

“The largest item for expenditure under ‘miscellaneous’ is superannu­ation payments for public servants, teachers and police.

“This consists of K325 million in superannuation payments autom­a­tically paid each fortnight to Nambawan Super, K300 million to fund the program to finally retire teachers and other public servants that had been left on the public payroll for years without the funding to formally retire them even though they were aged more than 65, a further K200.

“K1 million in exit payments to public servants when they retire through exit payments to Nambawan Super to deal with all current retirees as well as four smaller superannuation payments for other schemes.”

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The Mexican standoff over the closure of Papua New Guinea government offices due to nonpayment of rentals has ended.

The National Court has ordered superannuation fund landlord Nambawan Supa Limited (NSL) to remove all locks to Vulupindi Haus, Treasury Haus, Eda Tano Haus in Waigani and Revenue Haus in downtown Port Moresby.

At the same time, the government has honoured its commitment to pay a further instalment of K30 million (NZ$15.3 million) to NSL, bringing the outstanding total paid up to K82 million (NZ$42 million).

The Waigani National Court presided by acting judge Justice Emma Wurr granted on Friday the ex-parte application filed by Finance Secretary Dr Ken Ngangan for the removal of locks to the buildings.

Dr Ngangan instituted the proceeding as the chairman of the Government Office Allocation Committee through his lawyer Milfred Wangatau of ACE Lawyers, ordering Nambawan Super Ltd to remove the locks on government offices.

NSL had locked doors to its buildings that housed major government departments over outstanding rental arrears.

The five major government agencies affected were the Department of Finance, Department of Treasury, Department of Lands, Department of National Planning and Internal Revenue Commission.

During the hearing, Wangatau submitted to the court that the state had paid NSL more than K50 million in September.

Committed to settle arrears
He submitted that while the state did admit that there may be some outstanding rental arrears, it stood committed to settle its arrears but NSL decided to go ahead and lock the offices.

“NSL’s abrupt decision to lock out very important government public service delivery agencies should be the last resort as it only goes to hold the people of the nation at ransom when vital government services are disrupted,” Wangatau submitted.

He added that damages would be irreparable if the reliefs sought in the application were not granted as it would certainly have an adverse effect on the public at large.

Wangatau further submitted that it was in the interest of justice that the court should grant temporary mandatory orders ordering NSL to unlock all the government offices and allow government business and public service delivery to return to normalcy pending the substantive hearing.

Justice Wurr agreed and granted the interim orders and adjourned the matter until this Friday, for inter parte hearing.

Among the orders issued, Justice Wurr ordered that the defendant (NSL), its employees, servants and agents must immediately unlock all doors to the Vulupindi Haus, Revenue Haus, Treasury Haus and Eda Tano Haus to allow staff and officers of the respective state departments to have access to ensure government business and service delivery can resume as usual.

Justice Wurr ordered NSL to comply with the orders immediately upon services of the orders.

NSL ‘relieved’
Meanwhile in a press statement, NSL said it was relieved to receive a further K30 million payment from the state last Friday in its new commitment to offset rental arrears it owes to the fund’s contributing members.

This brings the total amount paid by the state to K82 million.

And representatives from the Departments of Finance and Treasury have signed a Letter of Agreement committing to pay the outstanding balance of K90 million in a series of monthly payments starting in November.

Nambawan Super chairman Mr Reg Monagi said: “We are pleased to have received the second payment of K30 million and we thank the Departments of Finance and Treasury, who after extensive discussions and negotiations, have committed to an agreement for the settlement of these arrears.”

“Acting in good faith after the State’s positive actions, on Friday night, we lifted the lockout of the Revenue Haus (Internal Revenue Commission), Vulupindi Haus (Department of Finance) and EdaTano Haus (Department of Lands & Physical Planning) and Treasury Haus (Department of Treasury).

“We hope that as we have acted in good faith, the State will continue to honour its commitment to our members by settling the remaining outstanding rental arrears.

Retirement outcomes ‘now protected’
“Nambawan Super appreciates that the State has recognised how important the payment of these arrears are to ensuring that our over 214,000 members’ retirement outcomes are protected.

“The unpaid rentals that accumulated over three years have already impacted the returns for members causing fewer funds available to reinvest and grow.”

“Any further delays to the scheduled payments will have a further detrimental impact on the returns of Nambawan Super members.”

“NSL remains committed to working closely with the State to ensure the payment of all outstanding arrears are made as agreed in the payment schedule, and will not hesitate to lock out the State again if it is unable to do so,” Monagi said.

Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz