{"id":702078,"date":"2022-06-16T00:45:08","date_gmt":"2022-06-16T00:45:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?p=75254"},"modified":"2022-06-16T00:45:08","modified_gmt":"2022-06-16T00:45:08","slug":"make-history-and-vote-in-a-woman-instead-of-failed-men-says-pngs-siwinu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2022\/06\/16\/make-history-and-vote-in-a-woman-instead-of-failed-men-says-pngs-siwinu\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Make history\u2019 and vote in a woman instead of \u2018failed\u2019 men, says PNG\u2019s Siwinu"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>By Kolopu Waima in Mendi, Papua New Guinea<\/em><\/p>\n<p>She is brave &#8212; no other word can describe this Papua New Guinean woman.<\/p>\n<p>Ruth Undi Siwinu isn&#8217;t only challenging the norms and a huge field of male candidates in Southern Highlands, but knows the task ahead and she is prepared to take them head on.<\/p>\n<p>In a province where leadership is regarded as &#8220;men&#8217;s business&#8221;, Siwinu takes on everyone \u2013\u2013 including the sitting MP and Pangu strongman William Powi.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?s=PNG+elections\"><strong>READ MORE:<\/strong> Other PNG elections reports<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u201cLet\u2019s make history and vote a woman candidate into Parliament,\u201d Siwini told hundreds of supporters at her rally in Mendi, Southern Highlands Province.<\/p>\n<p>An independent candidate, Siwinu told the huge group that poverty was real in this province\u00a0 and a country that were blessed with vast resources that were bringing in billions of kina every year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI have travelled to the length and breadth of this province. I have been to all the five districts in the province and I saw that my people are still struggling to live,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhy are my people struggling when Southern Highlands is blessed with all resources and the country is sitting on the resources Southern Highlands produce.<\/p>\n<p><strong>&#8216;A mistake somewhere&#8217;<\/strong><br \/>\n\u201cThere is a mistake somewhere and we have to find out. We want a women leader to lead the province, we have given enough time to the men to lead the province but they have failed us big time,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Siwinu said male leaders in the province were not providing services that the people deserved.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey are playing too much politics and did not serve the people for many years. We have to stop this,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<p>She said that the national election has provided the opportunity for the people to change the leadership and vote in a women leader to drive Southern Highlands forward into the future.<\/p>\n<p>She urged all mothers, girls, aunties and youths to vote in a women candidate in this election to effect change in the province. She called on all women to rally behind her for a better Southern Highlands.<\/p>\n<p><strong>&#8216;Representing the marginalised&#8217;<\/strong><br \/>\n\u201cI am standing here representing you women, the marginalised. Women are the people who suffer most in this province and I want you all women to make a strong stand and make your vote count in Ruth Undi,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>She said she had spent K1 million (NZ$446,000) investing in Southern Highlands, helping women through her Mama Helpim Mama Charity organisation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI have Mama Helpim Mama charity organisation, though this organisation I spent K1 million helping Southern Highlands mothers.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I have seen the real struggle in the villages, I serve the people already, I am only need the political power to continue what I am doing,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Eighty six of the 2351 candidates registered for next month&#8217;s general election are women.<\/p>\n<p><em>Kolopu Waima<\/em> <em>is a PNG Post-Courier reporter. Republished with permission.<\/em><\/p>\n\n<p class=\"syndicated-attribution\">This post was originally published on <a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/2022\/06\/16\/make-history-and-vote-in-a-woman-instead-of-failed-men-says-pngs-siwinu\/\">Asia Pacific Report<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Kolopu Waima in Mendi, Papua New Guinea She is brave \u2014 no other word can describe this Papua New Guinean woman. Ruth Undi Siwinu isn\u2019t only challenging the norms and a huge field of male candidates in Southern Highlands, but knows the task ahead and she is prepared to take them head on. In<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":400,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,5,975,12076,12077,6,7,50057,12,431,366,21756,625,49230,14,15,49890,1743],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702078"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/400"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=702078"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702078\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":702079,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702078\/revisions\/702079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=702078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=702078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=702078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}