By Rich Bowden:

Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare today tabled in Parliament the results of a three-year corruption investigation into PNG’s Finance Department , promising people would “shudder in awe” at the level of corruption exposed.

PNG PM Sir Michael Somare. Credit: U.S. PO Mark Logico.

The probe has uncovered hundreds of millions of dollars in fraudulent claims due to the laxness of Finance officials, according a report today by the Australian News Network.

The inquiry found hundreds of millions of dollars was paid out in fraudulent claims against the state because public officials didn’t do their jobs.

The report details a litany of procedural breaches and collusion by bureaucrats with lawyers and other parties to process fraudulent claims.

Sir Michael told Parliament his administration would refer the matter to the police fraud squad and would set up a special task force to look at ways to implement the inquiry’s 75 recommendations.

The tabling of the report follows on from last month’s finding from an inquiry by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that called into question the accountability and transparency of use of public money for all but five of 1000 Papua New Guinea government agencies.

PAC Chairman Timothy Bonga told the PNG Post-Courier newspaper his investigation found accountability from the Government agencies had “collapsed miserably.”

“The whole functional system of the (Forest) Authority has collapsed and the original finding of the Auditor General that 100 million kina ($A40 million) simply disappeared and the (Forest) Authority had no ability to audit or trace these funds,” he said.

“In total, we have made inquiry into 1000 agencies, each examined from 2003 to 2008. The findings have shown that the management and accountability by our public servants and the government has collapsed miserably”.

PNG MP Sam Basil was quoted by AAP as saying the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) finding showed PNG had become a “failed state”.

Tags: papua new guinea corruption, png corruption probe, png finance, Sir Michael Somare