IF Government advisers were hunting for ideas to plot the course of government over the next few months and years, the social media is terribly awash with them.
Anything, from how to grow a small-to-medium enterprise (SME) to hyper-inflation and what to do with government-owned businesses are spit out here – free of charge of course and almost all of them worth nothing.
But there are some gems if you had time scouring through the verbal rubble.
But the Government need not look away, or about, to find inspiration.
Its own plans and those of other administrations ever since independence provide ample fodder for designing and redesigning every sector in the public and private domain.
The national goals and directive principles, the Vision 2050, the National Strategic Development Plan (2011-2030), and the various medium-term development plans account for every contingency.
The national budget each year, and the five-year provincial and district development plans, are supposed to dovetail into these overarching plans.
The giant in the room that nobody sees is called IMPLEMENTATION. Putting the plans into action.
Translating plans into policy and policy into projects complete with implementation schedules, budgetary allocations and completion deadlines and doing this consistently are what are lacking.
Simply putting getting things done is what needs to happen.
When a government promises through its plans and does not deliver, that is when the people lose their confidence and trust in it.
In its first 100 days’ plan, the Marape government put together an Economic Leadership Team to put together an “Economic Recovery Road Map and Execution” and announced that was critical.
First thing the new Government wanted to do in 2022 was to put together a strong ministerial team backed up by two strong technical teams from the central bank and Treasury, the two institutions mandated to prescribe the right economic prescriptions – monetary and fiscal policies.
The country was tightly in the grip of an extreme inflationary condition from the ongoing impacts of the Coronavirus through supply chain breakdowns and the Ukraine war, fuel shortage, foreign exchange shortfalls and climate change issues.
The priority was on economic repair.
It wanted to cut government spending on unnecessary costs by improving public sector reform to improve productivity and increase investments in economic enablers such as infrastructure and economic projects.
The net result aimed at was to create jobs, jobs and jobs – a million new jobs by 2027, Prime Minister James Marape said boldly at the time.
Most State-owned enterprises (SOEs) were crowding out the private sector, and the Government planned for privatisation in order for superfunds, landowners and SMEs to play a large factor through the fledgeling local Port Moresby Stock Exchange.
The Government planned for the best 20 to 30 year deals for Porgera, Wafi and Papua Liquefied Natural Gas projects and planned to kick-start them in the first 100 days of office.
The Government wanted to redirect resources sector royalty benefits and integrated development grants (IDG) to monetise the country’s rich agriculture land.
The Government planned to expand investments in the manufacturing sector as it is key to creating jobs.
To that extent, the Government planned to utilise cheap hydro carbon and other renewal energy and DMO (Domestic Market obligation) to develop a strong manufacturing sector.
Kumul entities’ set-up in the fisheries and forestry sectors were great initiatives to create jobs and bring processing on shore, rather than exporting jobs.
The Government planned to expand that formula in the climate change and carbon trade sector, Government could still have its virgin forest and still make money.
Finally, the Government planned to start repaying all debts since independence moving to surplus budget by 2027.
Those were the plans.
Whether or not the plans were achieved in the first 100 days, with 2027 arriving at a trot, it is time to review what has been achieved and what remains.
Such a review must run parallel to the expenditure review of the K52.7 billion PIP expenditure.
