Pacific Anti-Corruption Updates (20 February 2021): Cook Islands, Solomon Islands, Fiji, PNG

COOK ISLANDS

Cooks deny "sinister move" over audit delays.  Official documents show Cook Islands auditors repeatedly raised issues over hundreds of millions in state assets, taxes, loans and cash.

https://islandsbusiness.com/past-news-break-articles/item/3136-cooks-deny-sinister-move-over-audit-delays.html

 

SOLOMON ISLANDS

CSOs and UNDP Raise Public Awareness on Anti-corruption.  Development Services Exchange (DSE), the umbrella organisation of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in Solomon Islands, in partnership with UNDP successfully concluded the reflection workshop for five grantee organizations, beneficiaries of the Transparency and Accountability Project (TAP), which aimed to discuss the achievements of the CSO’s in combatting corruption, challenges ahead and plans for the future.

https://www.solomontimes.com/news/csos-and-undp-raise-public-awareness-on-anticorruption/10635

 

FIJI

Fiji will continue to withhold USP grant.  Fijian Minister for Economy highlighted in Parliament last week that Fiji will not release the University of the South Pacific (USP) grant of $27.7m (US$13.6 million) for the year 2020/2021 because of governance issues…[Minister] Sayed-Khaiyum adds that a simple independent investigation could solve governance issues within USP.

https://www.fbcnews.com.fj/news/fiji-will-continue-to-withhold-usp-grant/

 

USP Vice Chancellor Ahluwalia not a champion of good governance: Professor Naidu.  A former leading figure at the University of the South Pacific claims ousted Vice Chancellor Professor Pal Ahluwalia wasn’t always on the straight and narrow when it came to decision making…Naidu alleges that Ahluwalia is responsible for harassing and sacking several people, as well as the arbitrary appointment of his supporters to key positions.

https://www.fbcnews.com.fj/news/ahluwalia-not-a-champion-of-good-governance-naidu/

 

PNG

‘Too good to be true’: the deal with an Isis-linked Australian family that betrayed PNG's most marginalised.  A company owned by Australian brothers Mamdouh and Ibrahim Elomar – patriarchs of a notorious Sydney family linked to Isis and themselves formerly convicted of international bribery – have been found by a court in Singapore to have improperly paid more than $6m to a senior PNG official and his wife to buy a PNG timber company at an estimated discount of more than 90%.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/13/too-good-to-be-true-the-deal-with-an-isis-linked-australian-family-that-betrayed-pngs-most-marginalised

 

To know more about the UN Pacific Regional Anti-Corruption Project please contact:

Annika Wythes, Regional Anti-Corruption Adviser, UNODC, annika.wythes@un.org