ACT NOW has launched a new advertising campaign on radio and television calling on the PNG Forest Authority to take immediate action on the abuse of Forest Clearing Authority licences.

Eddie Tanago | Campaign Manager

ACT NOW is calling on the Prime Minister and regulatory agencies to take urgent action to address the huge discrepancies in log export values revealed in a recent report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

By Fr. Giorgio Licini, Caritas PNG Advocacy

By FORCERT

In Papua New Guinea, approximately 97% of land is customary, collectively controlled by clans, tribes and communities. This land serves as the foundation of life and security for the country’s rural communities, and is protected from alienation except under special circumstances, with the communities’ consent.

A new report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime provides evidence Papua New Guinea could be missing out on billions of Kina in taxes and royalties from the logging industry.

ACT NOW! and Jubilee Australia Research Centre are urging a United Nations Committee to act on human rights violations in PNG arising from illegal logging. The organisations have filed a formal request to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to consider taking urgent action at its next meeting in August. Bismarck Ramu Group has also endorsed the action.

A new report on logging in Papua New Guinea calls for urgent action by authorities in PNG and overseas to address long standing issue related to illegal logging, human rights abuses and environmental harm.

Image: Campaign Manager Eddie Tanago attends a regional forest crime seminar at INTERPOL headquarters in Singapore, Dec. 2024

A criminal charge of identity theft against ACT NOW Campaign Manager Eddie Tanago has been struck out by Magistrate Mr. Paul Puri Nii, in the District Court at Waigani.

ACT NOW is urging the Ombudsman Commission to act decisively as the 31st March deadline passes for Districts to submit their Service and Infrastructure Improvement Program acquittals.

The Ombudsman Commission should immediately publish a list of Districts that have failed to comply with the deadline and to take action under the Leadership Code against those leaders who have defaulted.

Continued inaction will erode public trust and enable the misuse of billions of Kina in public funds.