PAPUA NEW GUINEA. MINISTER DEFENDS DEATH PENALTY FACT FINDING TOUR

Papua New Guinea Justice Minister Mark Maipakai's extensive death penalty fact-finding trip overseas in 2004 came under the spotlight. Finschaffen MP Guao Zurenuoc asked Maipakai to explain why the death penalty legislation was taking so long. Zurenuoc wanted to know why the minister spent more money looking for answers abroad while the people waited. Maipakai defended the trip and said his report on the trip to Singapore, Malaysia, England and the United States would be tabled soon. He said his own report "was ready" but he was waiting for the input of two other cabinet colleagues before it reached the National Executive Council [cabinet]. 
"There are lot of cultural implications so we cannot rush it (the law)," he said. Maipakai and his delegation had to go the US where the death penalty was practised and to the UK, where it was not. This was so that they could get a balanced view.
"Yes, we did visit Singapore," he said in response to Mr Zurenuoc's questions. "We did not visit the execution chamber but we did visit a maximum security prison. But it was not a female prison, I do not know where you got that information." The delegation did not visit Malaysia because there was an election going on in the country. Maipakai did not say when the death penalty law was likely to be enforced. Zurenuoc said opinion on the death penalty was divided but there was no doubt many law-abiding citizens wanted extreme measures to control the sharp rise in violent crime. He said violent crime was damaging the image of the country and that perpetrators of violent crime were getting ruthless and that only the death penalty would send a strong message to them.