The following letter is a timely reminder...

Source: The National

THE prime minister has finally received the interim report of the commission of inquiry (COI) into the special agricultural and business leases (SABL).

The negative reaction from land­owners throughout PNG showed the initiators failed to adequately plan and assess the SABL so that any negative implications were either avoided or resolved properly under established provisions.

Without completely understan­ding the implications, the initiators made a blunder by implementing the SABL and when problems started, the relevant authorities were unprepared and were so overwhelmed that the SABL had to be halted.

As a result, thousands of kina in public funds were now used to fund the COI. Likewise, the same can be said about the manner in which the outcomes-based education (OBE) was in­corporated into our education syste­m.

The initiators did not anticipate the implications and did not envi­sage the fact their actions would gradually demean the quality of education in the country.

The government is now spending millions of kina to gradually phase OBE out because the quality of education has been compromised.

I call on the go­vernment and its agencies to tho­roughly assess any development models before sanctioning them for implementation, regardless of whe­ther they were initiat­ed domestically or abroad. Pilot testing must be an integral component of the assessment pro­cess.

As history has shown, the lack of assessment has resulted in the termination of good development models with positive socio-economic outcomes because implications and challenges were not anti­cipated and there were no strategies to address them.

Failed development models from abroad also unsuspectingly pass through our public service ma­­­-chinery, draining away scarce re­sour­ces and preventing overall growth and development of the nation.

For far too long, PNG has become a dumping ground for development models because our methods to assess them are weak and riddled with loopholes.

The SABL and OBE should now serve as important lessons in new deve­lopment models.
It is therefore imperative for all government agencies to have stringent assessment guidelines before recommending any development models for implementation because so much public funds have been wasted on inquiries and attempts to remedy failed ones.

Eugene Kambut
Port Moresby