| At the NCDC, an office — called the Urban Safety Unit — is being opened. The office comes under the NCDC Community and Social Services Department and directly focuses on co-ordinating the NCDC’s efforts with those of stakeholder agencies in addressing Port Moresby's safety issues.
The need for such an office arose after law and justice agencies — NCDC’s partners in this fight against crime — agreed a central point should be established to co-ordinate urban safety efforts.
About four months ago, City Hall began mobilising a team. Headed by City Manager Peter Loko and directly overseen by community and social services acting deputy city manager Iva Kola, the Urban Safety unit already has the services of an expert adviser — Steve Sims — from the Law and Justice Sector Program (LJSP) who moved into City Hall some two months ago.
Mr Sims’ job is to become the go-between for NCDC and LJSP and AusAID, soliciting resources, expertise, funding and providing advice to the NCDC on how best these pressing issues can be addressed.
Under the auspices of the NCDC and its Urban Safety Committee, efforts to combat law and order issues in Port Moresby were packaged into what is called the Yumi Lukautim Mosbi Projek (Let's Look After Moresby Project).
The Yumi Lukautim Mosbi Projek (YLMP) now becomes the implementation mechanism for a much bigger goal — the implementation of the National Government's Medium Term Development Strategy (MTDS).
Many will be aware of the MTDS and how the Government is trying to get the country back on the track to economic recovery. Under the strategy, the road to economic recovery is first of all to address the crime problem — a big barrier to the country’s economic recovery.
The National Government, through its National Coordinating Mechanism (NCM), has identified urban safety as one of the issues to be addressed. The onus was then given to the municipal authorities to spearhead these efforts. At the NCDC, the Urban Safety Committee was formed. The committee comprises members from law and justice sector agencies — the police, Correctional Institutional Services, Department of Justice and Attorney-General, Magisterial Services, National Planning and Implementation, Prime Minister's Department, Department of Transport, National Road Safety Council, AusAID, Peace Foundation Melanesia, Consultative Implementation Monitoring Council, the Justice Advisory Group, the Law and Justice Sector Program Working Group and the Community Justice Liaison Unit.
The committee has been sitting monthly since the end of last year. Back |
