The Talasea district in West New Britain has made a K20 million District Services Improvement Program (DSIP) spending of the 2014 and 2015 financial year to the Department of Implementation and Rural Development (DIRD).
MP Francis Marus and his district development authority officers made the acquittal presentation to the DIRD Secretary Paul Sai’i in Port Moresby last week.
Marus who is also the Higher Education Minister in presenting the financial spending of his district indicated the need for reporting by members of Parliament on public funds and also for DIRD to conduct physical monitoring against projects on the ground.
“I am happy and thank you for your support. K10 million is a lot of money to the district. With these kind of funding allocation, we can deliver impact projects such as rural electrification, water supplies, markets, roads, bridges, hospitals, schools among others,” he said.
He stressed that this is the first time that the government putting huge money into the districts. It is up to us Members to spend the money properly so that the people see tangible developments in the Districts.
“I don’t know why some MPs never deliver, I think some MPs never re-elected because of their own failure, our people are the judges who will vote during the elections, the people will deicide during the election time whether you would be re-elected or not based on your performance,” he said.
Marus said Talasea has seven Local Level Government and the district itself consists of huge landmass with over populated areas and delivery of government servicers is very arduous, however has managed to deliver with the support of his DDA.
He said the MPs no need to complain that there is no funding available for development of their district because every year O’Neill government is allocating DSIP or PSIP grants down to the districts and it’s the responsibility of the MPs to budget their development grants and spend wisely to intended purpose and achiever results.
DIRD acting Secretary Paul Sai’i said it is a mandatory requirement under the Public Finance Management Act, Financial Instruction 1A/2013 and Administrative Guidelines to report to the Government of their spending.
Sai’i commended Talasea district for successfully implementing DSIP funded projects and programs that would luckily benefit the people which have been missing government services.