Sasindran Muthuvel

Power outages attributed to outstanding bills

State Owned Enterprise Minister, Sasindran Muthuvel, said this when responding to questions raised by Northern Governor, Garry Juffa, at today’s Parliament sitting.

Governor Juffa questioned the State Owned Enterprise Minister over the constant power outages over the last two weeks.

He said it was affecting everyone.

“Em i afectim bisnis, gavman na laif,” Juffa stated.

Over the last two weeks, PNG Power has conducted a load shedding exercise to ration fuel stocks.

SOEs due for restructure

As a result, SOEs are in for a restructure under the new Minister, Sasindran Muthuvel, who was the then West New Britain Governor.

“State Owned Enterprises are not declaring dividends to state,” said Marape.

“Many are working outside Treasury’s scrutiny. Many of our SOEs are building empires of their own. There will be a restructure in our SOEs. There will be greater visibility in Kumul Consolidated Holdings, we will set up other Kumul subsidiaries and the minister for SOE will be in charge of those areas.”

WNB presents 2019 Budget to Treasurer

Governor Muthuvel made these remarks after presenting a budget of K245.37 million to Treasurer and Deputy Prime Minister, Charles Abel, in Port Moresby.

With the theme; ‘Promoting Rural Empowerment through Inclusive Opportunities’, Muthuvel said the 2019 Provincial Budget is the most fairly distributed in terms of addressing capacity and development needs in the 12 LLGs as identified and directly nominated by LLGs.

The K245.37m (K245,267,925m) Budget represents an increase of about 17.7 percent from the 2018 Provincial Budget figures.

Mobile squad boosts search for prison escapees

West New Britain Governor Sasindran Muthuvel confirmed that 39 prisoners escaped from Lakiemata on Oct 28.

Governor Muthuvel said the lack of logistics and manpower is slowing down the search.

He told this newsroom that with the additional manpower from the Mobile Squad 18, the search of the prisoners will be done quickly.

However, West New Britain Provincial Police Commander, Superintendent John Midi, is confident most, if not all the escapees, will be recaptured soon.

WNB Governor emphasizes importance of education

West New Britain Governor Sasindran Muthuvel uttered this remarks when officially opening a K50, 000 worth elementary classroom at Buluma in the Hoskins area today.

WNB Governor Sasindran Muthuvel in his official speech said education is the web that keeps community intact because it opens up individual mindsets and enhances each member of the community to become proactive in contributing meaningfully to its development and added that education gives hope for the future generation.

The Buluma elementary school new classroom costs about K50 000.

Muthuvel questions Govt on electoral boundaries

Minister for Inter-Government Relations, Kevin Isifu, said this when responding to questions raised by West New Britain Governor Sasindran Muthuvel in Parliament on Friday.

Biala LLG in WNB has a population of 60,000 people while Talasea district has close to 300,000 people; making service delivery a challenge.

Governor Muthuvel asked if the government was serious about the electoral boundaries separation and create additional districts.

Provincial govt commits to back Kimbe Cutters

Governor Muthuvel said they will also be approaching major companies in the province to support their bid.

The Governor added that Hunters Coach, Michael Marum, has accepted their invitation to attend and assist in the selection of players for the Kimber Cutters team when its hosts trial matches for players.

The province has held several competitions and trials as part of its bid for the rugby league team.

(Loop filepic of WNB rugby league teams)

WNB Governor confident with franchise team

Muthuvel, who was in the province to witness another staging of the Cutters’ last leg of the 9s tournament in Kimbe last weekend, said he is confident that the team will make it into the competition in 2019.

With the aim of selecting potential and talented players for the Kimbe Cutters team next year, the provincial leaders have put every effort into the bid.

Governor Muthuvel said their bid is also getting support from senior political leaders around the country, including Enga Governor Peter Ipatas.

Muthuvel citizenship status a ‘wild’ allegation

The second term MP had the petition against him dismissed yesterday as it was found to be incompetent.

Chris Lagisa alleged that Muthuvel had a dual citizenship status however, the court found that was just an assumption.

Muthuvel’s Indian passport was surrendered to the Indian High Commission in May of 2007.

“The court described very clearly that if the petitioner was genuine, he would have given the evidence to court,” Muthuvel told the media after the decision.

Bill will allow competition for PPL: Basil

This was recently revealed by Energy Minister Sam Basil in Parliament.

Basil was responding to a question by the Governor of West New Britain, Sasindran Muthuvel, concerning plans for the rollout of the rural electrification program.

Minister Basil said the K5 million allocated for the rollout in all districts is small hence they will resort to use the MSK boxes.

“PNG Power is currently selling the boxes for K750 per box, but we can negotiate with another supplier who will sell it cheaper to us for K500,” Basil said.