Registrar of Political Parties and Candidates, Dr Alphonse Gelu, hopes the revised Organic Law on Integrity of Political Parties and Candidates (OLIPPAC) is passed before the elections.
Despite being approved by the National Executive Council (NEC) in 2014 after a review of the OLIPPAC beginning in 2012, the revised law is yet to pass the floor of Parliament.
In October, last year, the revised law appeared on the business paper however a lack of numbers on the floor of Parliement failed to see the law passed.
“For me as the registrar, this is quite disappointing because we have worked very hard and there are changes that we have proposed in the revised organic law and we need to have that law passed on the floor of parliament in order for us to start moving ahead, in terms of what we are trying to do in strengthening political parties,” Said Gelu.
He says the current law focuses on regulating the behavior of members of Parliament and One of clauses of the law was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 2010 which resulted in the review of the OLIPPAC.
The revised OLIPPAC has moved away from theses to developing the foundations of political parties.
“So we moved away from regulating the behavior of members of parliament into strengthening political parties. And I think that this is the best way for us to go, because parties are the organization. They are the institutions and we want to grow them, we want to make sure that political parties in PNG or the party system we have in PNG must be strong,” he said.
Parliament resumes on January 24 for the 2017 sitting while the final session will be in March when Parliament be dissolved, before the issue of Writs in April.
Gelu hopes the revised law which comes with six constitutional amendments is passed in either sitting.
He believes these amendments have genuine justifications in improving democracy and the operations of Parliament as well as political parties.
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