Sellout crowd expected for final

Posted by The National

THE National Football Stadium is expected to be filled to capacity when the Lae Tigers and Hela Wigmen meet in the Digicel Cup grand final in Port Moresby on Sunday.
Sections of Lahara Avenue and Bisini Parade will be inundated as supporters of both teams look to secure a spot in the 15,000-seat stadium ahead of the 3pm kick-off.
While the fanfare is brewing in the lead-up to the country’s showpiece sporting event, Tigers coach Stanley Tepend and his Wigmen counterpart Andiki Andrew are quietly plotting their return to the hot seat as Digicel Cup premiers.
Minor premiers Tigers, who are coming into the match off a week’s rest, last won the competition in 2017 and underdogs Wigmen are looking to break a five-year drought.
“We have come the easy way while the opposition have come the harder way. We respect Andiki and his players for that,” Tepend said in Port Moresby yesterday.
“Our preparations have been good. Several of our players have recovered from niggling injuries and are ready for the game.
“The Wigmen will have huge big support which they will use to their advantage. But we are focusing on ourselves and our preparations. This is a complete different ball game and we need to be ready.”
Andiki said: “We started the season badly. At one stage, we were second from bottom but we climbed to the sixth and sneaked into the top-six finals.
“I brought on board former PNG Kumuls rake Charlie Wabo to assist me with a number of structures that were are incorporating in our game.
“Wabo has inspired our players to perform at their best.
“We respect the Tigers as they are one of the top teams in the competition. We’ve come this far through discipline and commitment and I thank the Lord for his guidance.”
Tigers vice-captain Enoch Sine said they were looking forward to putting in performance worthy of winning the premiership.
Injured Benjamin Hetra — one of the surviving players from the 2014 premiership-winning season — is in contention to play, provided the Wigmen captain passes a medical test.


Go to this link for more: https://www.thenational.com.pg/sellout-crowd-expected-for-final/

God helps those who help themselves: Maiyua

By ELIAS LARI - The National

THERE is life out there awaiting those who have the courage to pursue their dreams, heart’s desire and hopes despite facing hardship and circumstances in life, says a mother of two.
Many lose hope and fall off the track after coming across hardship, thinking that this is life’s offer, she said.
Joyce Maiyua earned K60 a fortnight but didn’t give up her dream despite facing so many challenges in her marriage, family life and in the community she lived in.
The 34-year-old had dropped out of school after doing her grade 10 at the Notre Dame Secondary School, Western Highlands, in 1988. She was actually forced to quit by issues such tribal fighting at her Baiyer village.

Joyce Maiyua displaying her awards on theory and practical after the graduation on Feb 29 at the Tinsley CHW training school in Baiyer.

Maiyua hails from the Rami tribe, Maiyua clan, Manzip village in Western Highlands.
She did not stay around doing nothing though, believing that she still could become a nurse and fulfil her dream.
Maiyua’s aim was to further her education first to open more doors.
She focused on informal marketing for four years and in 2003 she had saved enough to apply to the St Paul’s Secretarial College in Mt Hagen.
After completing basic computing in 2004, she joined a computer shop to work and was paid K60 for a fortnight.
She knew she was being cheated so she sought employed at aa primary school in Mt Hagen in 2004.
Maiyua earned a K120 a fortnight,she was happier and kept the job until 2008 but soon found it hard to live on her earning with her two children.
So she moved on to Boroko Motors – from 2010-2011.
Maiyua was asked by her old school to come back and take the position she had but with a better pay. She became office secretary.
She upgraded her marks until 2006doing grades 11 and 12.
She applied for a position with the Mt Hagen Provincial Hospital as secretary to the director medical service (DSM) and was accepted in 2012
Maiyua was often touched while dealing with the problems of the sick.
She had openings for community health worker training and chose training at Baiyer in 2017 because she was a local and also wanted to be close to her two children.
She finally graduated in February.
With no permanent job now, Maiyua decided to return to the hospital and voluntarily help the Western Highlands health authority polio team as part of her job training.
She said that single mothers or widows should be thinking positive to achieve a better future.
“Since I dropped out from grade 10 or lived a separated (from her husband) life for six years , it did not stopped. I knew I had a task ahead to find myself a bright future,” Maiyua said.
“With God, all things are possible because He alone will help you when you start helping yourself.”
Maiyua said many women were becoming too dependent on their husbands which was becoming a major setback.
She said women could become equal partners with their male folks when they planned well because nothing good came for a person who was lazy.
“I still have a vision to move on to further my studies,” she said.
Maiyua said people who were lazy and expected handouts would never achieve their dream.
“My word to lazy people is stop praying to God to bless or help you when you don’t know how to take the first step because God helps those who help themselves.”

Go to this link for more: https://www.thenational.com.pg/god-helps-those-who-help-themselves-maiyua/

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Washington Post: Former Interior Department official who advocated for more drilling in Alaska joins oil company expanding operations in state

By Devan Cole - CNN

Washington (CNN)A former Interior Department official who oversaw oil and gas drilling on federal lands is joining an oil company with plans to expand operations in Alaska, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.

Joe Balash, who served as the department's assistant secretary for land and minerals management since late 2017, confirmed to the Post that he plans to begin working for Oil Search, a Papua New Guinea-based company that is "developing one of Alaska's largest oil prospects in years." Balash resigned from his post at the department last Friday, according to the paper.

Balash joins a growing list of former Trump administration officials who left their posts with the government for private sector jobs in industries they helped regulate, raising concerns among government watchdog groups and ethics experts. That list includes former Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt who began consulting for a Kentucky coal baron after resigning last year amid an ethics scandal.

The Post said Balash, who would not divulge details of his new role with Oil Search to the paper, said he would "abide by the Trump ethics pledge barring appointees from lobbying their former agencies for five years" despite the fact that he would be managing employees who would coordinate with the federal government on energy policy.

"I have a ton of restrictions dealing with the Department of Interior. Most of Oil Search's properties are state lands. There isn't really the federal nexus," Balash told the Post, which noted that the company has not bid on federal leases in Alaska.

According to the paper, the company has been "aggressively" growing its drilling operations in Alaska on state lands that are near two federal reserves the Trump administration is pushing to increase oil and gas development in. At Interior, Balash oversaw the department's lease sales on parts of those two reserves, the Post said. The paper also said Balash met with executives from the company multiple times while serving at the department.

CNN was unable to reach Balash for comment, and the Interior Department did not respond to CNN's request for comment on his new role.

Ethics experts told the Post that Balash's new role "raises potential conflict of interest issues, although part of it would depend on the nature of his negotiations with the firm before he left public office."

"At the point Balash began discussing employment opportunities with Oil Search, he was prohibited from personally and substantially participating in any particular matter that would affect Oil Search's financial interests," Brendan Fischer, a federal reform program director at the Campaign Legal Center, told the paper.

Danielle Brian, the executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, told the Post that "If this ends up being legal," it'll be "hard to have confidence that decisions he was making while he was working for the taxpayers were not impacted by his aspirations or hopes to go work for a company that was materially affected by his work."

Go to this link for more: https://edition.cnn.com/2019/09/04/politics/joe-balash-interior-department-oil-search-alaska/

Ex-US Interior official joins Papua New Guinea-based oil company Oil Search

By Tim Pearce - Washington Examiner

An ex-top official in the US Interior Department is joining a Papua New Guinea-based oil company days after leaving the Trump administration.

Joe Balash served roughly two years as the Department of the Interior’s assistant secretary for land and minerals management. Balash announced his departure from the government on Friday and confirmed his new position at Oil Search in an interview with the Washington Post on Tuesday.

Balash's work at the Interior included expanding oil development on federal lands in Alaska, such as the 1002 Area in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The 1002 Area is a 1.5 million-acre oil reserve created in 1980 as part of the same legislative package that established ANWR.

The Trump administration’s ethics pledge, which Balash signed after joining Interior, prohibits ex-administration officials from lobbying their former agencies for five years after they leave. Oil Search’s operations in the United States include Alaska, though the company’s business is largely on state lands.

Balash will work on energy policy for Oil Search. He said he will abide by the ethics pledge and refrain from lobbying Interior officials, but "I'll supervise those who do" need to work with the federal government.

"I have a ton of restrictions dealing with the Department of Interior," Balash said. "Most of Oil Search's properties are state lands. There isn't really the federal nexus."

Go to this link for more: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/ex-interior-official-joins-papua-new-guinea-based-oil-company