Elections

During Friday's nominations, the road blocks were set up in a way where vehicles moved in a one way in and one way out manner.

Officers on duty said so far, no major faults or incident in relations to the nominations have occurred.

Police are only controlling traffic at the main market area so supporters share a common a ground to campaign and support their candidates.

NCD Metropolitan police commander Ben Turi says police have advised all candidates to not drive into Boroko with huge truckloads of supporters.

He says there will be road blocks around the Five-Mile area as well as the Murray Barracks Taurama junctions. This is to deal with traffic flow into the area.

Turi suggested for candidates to utilise public places such as the Five-Mile, Jack Pidik or Gordon’s Unagi ovals, to address their supporters after they nominate; and not outside the Electoral Office.

During an awareness conducted at Kalo village in Hula recently, Gimana raised concerns on underage pregnancy that is affecting young girls in the village. 

"During the election period, a lot of candidates and supporters will carry cash to lure voters and young girls can become venerable to such situations," Gimana said.

He said young girls have become vulnerable to unsafe sex because of ignorance and called on parents to monitor the movements of their daughters during the election period.

Dr Gelu said it is influenced by the environment and culture of the people.  

“Our systems of elections in PNG are still very much influence by factors that are clearly unconventional, factors that are illegal and truly undemocratic.”

Dr Gelu was speaking on Tuesday, to journalists attending a media election training workshop conducted by the PNG Electoral Commission (PNGEC) and Australian Electoral Commission.        

He said the conduct of election is the core business of PNGEC.

The Election Training Workshop for journalist is organised by the PNG Electoral Commission and supported by the Australia Electoral Commission.

The three days’ workshop held outside of Port Moresby will end today.  

Deputy Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai in his opening remarks on Monday, urged the participants to understand the electoral cycle to assist them when disseminating information to the public.

That was an appeal from deputy Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai.

He was speaking at the PNG Electoral Commission run-election training for journalist.

"Media play a crucial role in keeping the necessary checks and balances and I believe you will do the same for the 2017 National Elections to ensure there is transparency and integrity in the whole election process," Sinai said.

"This is because misreporting and misinformation can lead to unrest and violence."

In  a highly competitive process,  participants from 22 provinces were selected from over 200 applicants and will be trained on critical national policy issues, parliamentary processes and campaign strategies from 6 to 13 March 2017 in Port Moresby.

With only three female MPs out of 111 in Papua New Guinea’s current parliament, women continue to be under-represented as political leaders and elected officials.

He says his decision will be made when there is sufficient support from the people and especially current parliamentarians for a new Government.

In a public statement in the media Sir Mekere said although he enjoys retirement from politics, he cannot ignore the plea of Papua New Guineans for him to re-enter politics.

“They all say you fixed it before, please come back and do it again.”

France, Germany and the Netherlands are holding elections later this year, and experts agree with former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden that Moscow will try to sway the results.

The voting infrastructure is expected to be relatively secure since all three countries use paper ballots.

But here's how Russian hackers (and others) could influence the outcome:

Phishing for dirt

Parliament will be in recess for the 2017 National Elections until the formation of the new government in September.

The main Bills to be addressed during this remaining parliament session will include the increased nomination fees and the reduced campaign period.

Prime Minister Peter O’Neill told Parliament in August last year that the election cost is increasing yearly and the PNG Electoral Commission must find a way to help subsidise the cost.

He said increasing the nomination fees for candidates is an area the government is looking into.