Papua New Guinea – Students of Mt Hagen Technical College (HATECO) in Western Highlands Province staged a protest march to stop the signing of Defence Cooperation Agreement between PNG and the United States.
Giving the same reasons, the University of Papua New Guinea, the University of Technology and the University of Goroka have all conducted protest marches demanding the Prime Minister James Marape not to sign the deal until and unless the citizens are fully aware of what is entailed in the document.
Mt Hagen City was crowded yesterday with vehicles as hundreds of students and people marched around the city demanding the government not to sign the pact.
Tertiary students throughout the country have had a sleepless night on Sunday planning and discussing a peaceful nationwide protest march, and with security personnel safeguarding the activities yesterday, the protests were delivered successfully.
“We have petitioned the government and have conducted the protest march nationwide for the reason that we want the government to make known the content of the pack agreement to the entire citizen and also table the document in the floor of parliament for people’s approval before signing it,” said one of the student leaders Gordon Walimbu, who is a final-year Political Science student at UPNG.
He said everything that was written in the Defence Cooperation Agreement must be in favour of the PNG and its people whereas the country’s sovereignty must be protected at all cost.
“W cannot be tricked and bullied as minorities to this great superpower country that has persuaded our government for its own interest.
We will never allow this to happen as this move is very dangerous for PNG. We are friends to all and enemy to none’ as stated in our international policy,” Mr Walimbu said.
He said tertiary students were very conscious about the sovereignty of the nation.