WHY $1M FOR CASINO HOTEL?
By ANDREW FANASIA
THE Government is paying $1 million in damages to Pacific Casino Hotel because Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare was a guest at the hotel at the time of the April riot.
That was the explanation officials from the Prime Minister offered when they appeared before Public Accounts Committee (PAC) last week.
PAC is inquiring into the $145 million supplementary budget the Government had prepared in order to keep services going until the end of this year.
The $1 million damage bill appeared under the Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (OPMC).
Opposition leader and PAC member Mathew Wale condemned the $1 million request, telling PMO officials Solomon Islanders should not be forced to foot this damage bill.
“OPMC should ask the loggers and mining company who are involved during the formation of the government to foot this bill and not money from poor Solomon Islanders,” Wale said.
“What will happen to other people or businesses who also suffered the same damage during the election of the Prime Minister?
“Should they come to the OPMC to make their claims?
“Or are you giving Pacific Casino Hotel a special treat because members of the government were quests at the hotel during the riot?”
An official of the OPMC who appeared before PAC said there are grounds for this kind of payment and one is the prime minister was using the hotel so the Office of the Prime Minister have to pay the claims.
Wale said he is not against Pacific Casino Hotel because they are just victims but the Prime Minister needs to be fair because there were others out there as well who suffered damages during the riot.
Meanwhile, Special Secretary to the Prime Minister Albert Kabui said they are not aware of any formal claims from Pacific Casino.
“But obviously this is something in terms of policy that I think the government needs to look at it to cater for situations likes this in the future,” Kabui said.
He also added that OPMC is also conscious of the precedence it may set and opening the flood gates for such claims to continue in the future.