Dede Sophie

 PNG Prime Minister contender James Marape says once his Pangu-coalition forms the new government, it will not waste time setting up its full cabinet at the earliest.  Pangu’s biggest coalition partner is the United Resource Party, with 11 Members, and led by Hagen Open re-elected MP William Duma.  Pangu has 17 coalition partners, and all independents declared so far have joined Pangu, bringing the Loloata camp number up to 82.  The number increases with the National Alliance’s Tony Wouwou for West Sepik Regional, declared this afternoon, with National Alliance a coalition partner.  With a high number confidence, Marape announced at Government House yesterday that the new government will announce its Full to Do list on the 7th of September and a Supplementary Budget will be delivered on the 8th of September.  Marape says this is the benefit of having a continuing government, because work was already started on reconstructing the country over the last three years, and they will build on...

We were surprised how good (small but good!) the Novi Sad vegan scene was! There are currently three properly vegan restaurants, many pekaras (bakeries) with posno (basically vegan, see below) pastries, wonderful farmers’ markets (we managed to identify three), many many mikromarkets (greengrocers’) everywhere, organic food shops (Zdrava Hrana) and supermarkets with decent produce and all the other stuff usually need (esp. powdered flax seed). Novi Sad was the first Serbian city we stayed in for more than a couple of nights. We weren’t sure we would actually arrive: our original goal was Belgrade, which had been our goal for at least two years: to simply be able to revisit there after lockdown, from one Eastern European capital (Budapest) to another. Actually, once, in the midst of the pandemic in 2020, around December in locked-down Budapest, having failed to get over the border via bus (which had all stopped), we caved and bought flight tickets to Belgrade – we...

Papua New Guinea Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai said the Commission will consult with relevant authorities including the Department of Justice and Attorney General to review the cost of legal fees that are charged by private firms on elections petitions and other matters. He said the State remains the single biggest clients to most of the law firms that are operating in the country, where all government departments and State agencies continue to hire their services. Mr Sinai said the government has been paying huge sums of money to private law firms without using an approved legal fee structure. “It is unfortunate that we don’t have a standardized or a prescribed legal fee structure that can be used as a guide to pay appropriate levels of fees to private lawyers. Currently the Commission is paying fees based on different categories of tasks that are undertaken, especially with election petitions. And that’s how we have been operating since the engagement of private lawyers in 2002 ...

This blog has been retired. The latest information on Blogger service availability will now be displayed on the  Apps Status Dashboard .