Introduction
On 12 December 2011 the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea
(PNG) held that the election of Peter O'Neill
as Prime Minister (PM) of PNG in August this year
was unconstitutional and unlawful. The Supreme Court ordered, among
other things, the immediate reinstatement of Sir Michael Somare as
PM.
The Supreme Court's decision and the events that have
followed it have raised a number of legal issues which may
significantly impact the private business sector in PNG. The
purpose of this briefing is to inform you of those issues and to
assist you to plan around them to the extent possible. This
briefing is based primarily on publicly reported information that
has been released during a challenging constitutional crisis which
has placed PNG in unchartered waters. Critical information
continues to unfold and therefore this briefing should be
considered preliminary in nature.
