Papua New Guinea's opposition leader says there are ominous signs for those hoping for free and fair elections next year.
Don Polye claims that new candidate rules, and appointments to authorities conducting the polls, favour the position of the ruling People's National Congress party.
The government plans to increase the basic nomination fee for those intending to contest general elections in the middle of next year, from $US300 to $US3000.
Furthermore, Don Polye says other requirements on submissions by intending candidates seriously disadvantage people in PNG's many rural communities.
He spoke to Johnny Blades.
Papua New Guinea opposition leader Don Polye.
Photo: Supplied
Transcript
DON POLYE: There is a lot of flexibility to the ruling Peter O'Neill's party the People's National Congress so that the sitting MPs now get the money that then means they can pay for the nomination. Whereas people like me and my party we don't have the money we have to really work within our means which is very difficult to enrol so many candidates with a 10 thousand kina nomination fee for every candidate that we endorsed.
JOHNNY BLADES: Some of your MPs that came through the election in 2012 with you, some of them have since joined the PNC. So this power of the executive has really hurt the party system, hasn't it?
DP: Yeah, you are right. I described it as the cannibalisation of parties in the country by Peter O'Neill and PNC which I think is very undemocratic; it is not suitable for a young democracy like Papua New Guinea. But I see that has been ongoing and I have lost my MPs to the PNC - 10 of them. And you know that out of the three women that got elected, two of them were endorsed by my party and they have also joined up with the PNC. So that 10 thousand kina nomination fee will really make it difficult for me to endorse more women and more people who are capable with quality leaders to contest in the elections.
JB: I hear that the police are going to be managing it (the elections) from within each province rather than the main HQ in Moresby. Do you think there is anything in that?
DP: There are many things that happen that are not right, like you said the police will be put under the care or the authority of the governors in the province and most of the governors are members of Peter O'Neill's ruling People's National Congress Party. So it is a start in the wrong direction to achieve a good, freely conducted election. We believe that there will be a lot of influence and a lot of rigging going on. And police people have been put in to the organisation's structure. The Defence Commander is a cousin brother of the prime minister. The electoral commissioner is not running the electoral commission. The deputy electoral commissioner who has been recently appointed, he is also the cousin brother of Peter O'Neill and his men. So what the prime minister is doing is putting people in positions that are strategic in key positions, those people that he can easily get their support in making the elections convenient for him, but not necessarily free and democratic and fair and just elections for the people of Papua New Guinea.
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