Very interesting Editorial; lays out Somare done

[Palm]

Very interesting editorial in National. Explains how since Sir Michael's leave of absence was rescinded last Friday by parliament, he is not eligible to return to office. That move essentially takes the SC decision out of play and since O'Neill was supported 64-0 in the parliament vote of confidence, it will be hard to not have him as PM going forward. There is of course question as to whether this can be determined to be contempt of court, but it could take a long time to get all of this straightened out.:
"Testing time ahead for PNG laws
Source:
The National, Monday 12th December 2011
IN a move that pre-empts the Supreme Court decision due today, parliament last Friday voted to rescind the leave of absence granted to Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare in May this year.
This move effectively negates any decision of the court in that it now effectively creates a vacancy in the position of Sir Michael as prime minister.
If the courts determine the O’Neill government was illegally elected, Sir Michael is no longer MP and, therefore, is deemed ineligible to hold the post. There is a vacancy in the post and, in obedience to the law, it will become the first business of parliament to elect a new prime minister.
Parliament effectively showed how it will
vote if that eventuality arose by voting 64-0 in
support of the O’Neill-Namah regime last Friday.
The interesting question, of course, is whether or not the vote to rescind the leave of absence for Sir Michael might be held to be in contempt of proceedings before the courts.
The so-called government in limbo, pending the court decision, is adamant that the decisions by parliament are absolute.
Its reasons stem from the fact that Sir Michael has been ousted as the member for East Sepik once before.
Friday’s motion was the second time Sir Michael has been removed as member for East Sepik. The first was on Sept 6 when Speaker Jeffrey Nape summarily dismissed Sir Michael, alleging that he had missed three consecutive sittings of parliament.
He included in his statement the opinion that the leave of absence granted to Sir Michael in May was defective.
He said the leave should have covered three sittings of parliament and not just one.
The speaker’s actions of Sept 6 directly contradicted the position of his own principle adviser in parliament, clerk Don Pandan, who had advised the Grand Chief in writing earlier the same day that he had only missed two sittings of parliament and was quite safe.
Armed with the clerk’s letter and the questionable interpretation by the speaker of the leave of absence, Sir Michael went to court challenging his removal as member for East Sepik.
Although this was a separate matter, it had a direct bearing on the special reference by the East Sepik provincial executive council challenging the validity of the O’Neill government and, so, it was lumped together and Sir Michael joined the reference as an intervener.
Excepting the question of contempt, the motion last Friday now removes any questions about Sir Michael missing out on three sittings of parliament. With the leave of absence rescinded, he now has missed three consecutive sittings of parliament.
This also affects his eligibility to remain prime minister should the court decide so.
The ministry, including the position of prime minister, is a parliamentary executive post according to section 141 of the Constitution and, therefore, no person who is not an MP is eligible to be appointed a minister and a minister who ceases to be a member of parliament also ceases to hold office as a minister which includes the prime minister.
Another important question now, and into the future, is whether the actions of parliament can be put on trial in a court of law.
Both the judiciary and the executive are independent and equal arms of government with none superior to the other. Each has its own important duty.
Parliament makes laws. The courts interpret the laws.
Did parliament break the law when it elected Peter O’Neill prime minister on Aug 2? That is clearly a question the courts can deal with. It is a simple matter of interpreting section 142 of the Constitution.
But, has parliament invited contempt of the courts by its motions, votes and decisions resulting in the removal of Sir Michael as member for East Sepik? That is not so clear-cut.
Section 115, which confers parliamentary privileges, states explicitly that no member of parliament is subject to the jurisdiction of any court in respect of the exercise of his powers or the performance of his functions, duties or responsibilities except for the operation of the leadership code.
No member of parliament is liable to civil or criminal proceedings, arrest, imprisonment, fine, damages or compensation by reason of any matter or thing that he has brought by petition, question, bill, resolution, motion or otherwise or has said before or submitted to the parliament or a committee of the parliament.
It will be interesting to see how this is tested in the days ahead.
For now, we repeat our own appeal and echo the prime minister’s and Sir Michael’s call for peace, level-headedness and calm."
http://www.thenational.com.pg/?q=node/26623

[Palm]

Of at least equal importance is the revelation that Sir Michael nearly dies last spring. He's had an aeortal valve problem for many years and had to be flown to Singapore as he was gravely ill. He actually went into heart failure while there. This is why parliament rescinded his leave of absence last Friday. He should have revealed this info when he applied for his LOA; had he done so it never would have been granted. This is the grounds they had to rescind; seems pretty strong. With no approval he would lose his seat, and no one can serve as PM without a seat in parliament. Once again, when the facts come out it appears that O'Neill's appointment is much more solid.:
"Sir Michael had heart problems

By Peter Korugl

GRAND Chief Sir Michael Somare had a serious heart problem for 10 to 15 years before he was operated on in Singapore early this year.
Deputy Prime Minister Belden Namah informed Parliament that Sir Michael had an Aortic Valve disease and he was flown to Singapore on march 29 due to heart failure.
Mr Namah said on April 21, Sir Michael underwent open heart surgery and was put into the Intensive Care Unit and he developed a cardiac arrest on May 4 and had to be resuscitated followed by corrective surgery.
He said on May 11, Sir Michael developed further bleeding and was rushed to the operating theatre and the surgeons had to correct that as well.
The account was given by Mr Namah to Parliament last Friday to show that the former Government tried to hide the facts surrounding the health of Sir Michael and mislead the MPs into agreeing to grant him the leave of absence.
Mr Namah said the startling information pertaining to the health of Sir Michael was revealed during the course of the hearing of the Supreme Court Reference on the legality of the election of Peter O’Neill as Prime Minister, which was not known to the Parliament and the people of PNG.
“According to the Convention of the West Ministerial system of Government, these were more than adequate grounds for the member (Sir Michael) to resign from the Parliament but he did not.
“At no time did the member or National Executive Council and its members inform the Parliament that the member was undergoing a life threatening open heart surgery.
“Here we are not talking about an ordinary member but someone who holds the highest office of the country and his matter is not a matter of secret for the Somare family or the NEC alone,” Mr Namah said. He said no report was tabled in Parliament; his constituents of East Sepik was not informed of the life threatening condition prior to the granting of the leave.
Mr Namah said it was of paramount importance that a MP who was seeking leave of absence must make full and proper disclosure of relevant material in good faith before Parliament grant the leave of absence.
“This was not done in this instance,” he said.
Mr Namah then moved that Parliament rescind its decision to grant leave of absence to Sir Michael on May 17. Parliament voted for the motion.
Meanwhile Sir Michael told AAP yesterday that he was willing to serve as prime minister again, but he said he was unsure if he would run for his East Sepik electorate at the 2012 election.
Sir Michael’s comments came as the Governor-General Sir Michael Ogio signed the instruments dismissing him as MP for East Sepik and the vacancy in the East Sepik Provincial Seat was gazette.
“ I am willing to serve as prime minister again,” the 76-year-old Sir Michael told AAP.
“Although I do not know if I will run for East Sepik again. There is a lot to consider. I cannot believe they have done this to me, after 43 years — 44 next year,” Sir Michael said of the decision by the Parliament to rescind its decision to grant him leave of absence."
http://www.postcourier.com.pg/20111212/news03.htm

[Tree]

Hola Muchachos!
Looks like O'Neill has all but officially prevailed.
Only question is, will SC find him constitutionally legit or make the Parliament vote once again to support O'Neill?
How many id's can we have here STP? HoHoHo

[admin]

Hmm, he doesn't seem too fit for office anymore, and both considerably shortens the odds of any return. Supreme court within hours..

[admin]

Hello Tree, Just the one ID I'm afraid.. I know, I know, many will be disappointed...

[Palm]

I think he knows it's over. Another article talks about his saying that he "thinks" he still would like to finish out as PM, but would probably not run for his East Sipik seat again. I think O'Neill has actually been pretty "nice" to Sir Michael. For a while I thought he was being more shrewd than just doing things right. Having to go public with the fact that Sir Michael nearly died in Singapore and was in heart failure was not something he probably wanted to do. When that evidence came out in the hearing about whether he should be granted a LOA or not, but the judge went ahead and granted it showed clouded judgement. That original vote to put O'Neill makes much more sense now. They did what they had to do, then proceeded to show that the judge acted incorrectly. I think in the end what they did was constitutional, and that was emphasized by Friday's 64-0 vote of confidence for O'Neill. Also a letter I saw stated that originally last Friday the judges fully intended to act against the challenge to the CJ. Then after recessing and coming back they stated that the information presented was material and needed to be considered, so they postponed until today.

Tough for them now to even come back with a decision that O'Neill was appointed unconstitutionally; Somare lied/withheld crucially important information when he requested his LOA. The SC should rule to agree with the recission of the LOA request by parliament, rule O'Neill as properly appointed, and move ahead with other important parliamentary actions to get ready for the elections. Too much to do in a very short period of time.

[Tree]

Most certainly and the winners will be the people of PNG if O'Neill and future leaders continue weeding out the corrupt bureaucrats and politicians. Somare isn't the first pol to not bow out gracefully.

[admin]

You're making perfect sense, and one can only hope the SC is infused with the same clear logic as you. Bit of a black box for me though, that Supreme Court. Could there be legal technicalities at play, or even political divisions and/or loyalties running deep? We'll soon find out. Hope it's not like a boxing match where you think one guy has clearly won only for the jury to come up with a surprise, which more often than not favors the incumbent (like Pacquiao in his latest fight)

[Palm]

I think the "deep loyalties" were concentrated in the CJ. He has now been called out for his decision in the LOA request and decision by him to allow Sir Michael to hide info and deceive. I think O'Neill will continue to do what he has to; if he needs to start pushing the corruption button now and disclose what they have discovered with the task force, he will. He has charted a very strategic path; I still believe he has received very good coaching from AUS. It wouldbe very easy for them to aid in the corruption discovery; Somare and others probably have a community in Cairns called "Little PNG" dotted with very nice condos, a very good heart clinic, Somare sandwich shops, and a Bank of SM.

64-0 vote of confidence; I would guess most or all in parliament know the gritty details and have the chance to clear themselves of any past association with the corruption of the past and be seen as staking the crucial step of moving PNG to the next level. They know what they must do. The resource boom will provide them only real chance they have at becoming a regional power. Squander this chance and Straight-cut circumcisions will be all PNG is remembered for.

[Palm]

HoHoHo, per Laim Fox just now:"The #PNG govt has passed retrospective laws legalizing the removal of Sir Michael as PM on August 2" Not sure if that means SC or whether that is reference to parliament's action last week. Using the term "laws" leans toward a SC decision, but never know when a journalist is reporting.