"Papua New Guinea has an abundance in natural resources, but poor governance and corruption have prevented this wealth from reaching ordinary citizens.”

This sadly is the most common summary of Papua New Guinea. It is usually followed by a phrase describing the government’s lack of service delivery and the lack of development in centers outside of the Nations Capital. We can blame the Members of Parliament and successive governments for our lack of goods and services delivery, our lack of development and our lack of empowerment, but there is a point when we have to stop and realize that we are as much to blame.

In this country we follow a political system called ‘DEMOCRACY’, in this system everyone that is 18 years old and above, that is of sound mind and health has the power to CHOOSE their representatives i.e. Member’s of Parliament, through the election process.

For the last four months there has been a political impasse with both Mr Peter O’Neil and Sir Michael Somare each claiming that they are the rightful head of government. Both say that they are constitutionally correct. Mr O’Neil’s claim is through his support from the majority of members of parliament; Sir Michael’s is through the courts ruling. You most likely have heard this and are quite sick of hearing about this debacle. Mudslinging, playground brawls and verbal diarrhea has been seen, heard and experienced by all of Papua New Guinea. The antics of our so-called leaders can only be described as embarrassing.

It is our time! This is the time we take the power back from the ‘government’ and put it back into the hands of all ordinary citizens of Papua New Guinea. Members of parliament are only members because of your vote or LACK OF IT. If you want to make a change you can start by taking elections seriously. When you start to exercise your rights this helps to build up muscles, so you can have a bigger impact when you punch-so to speak. Papua New Guinea’s situation may not change in 2012, or even 2013 but it as the saying goes “Rome wasn’t built in a day” if we keep at it, eventually we the people of Papua New Guinea will dictate where our country goes and not just have a miniscule elite dictating where we are going and when.