O’Neill’s Call to Keep Hands Off the SPV Deserves Strong Support

by DANIEL PUNDU

In Papua New Guinea’s long-running struggle over resource benefits, Peter O’Neill has delivered one of the clearest interventions in years. His demand that politicians keep their hands off the Special Purpose Vehicle tied to PNG LNG landowner and provincial equity is not obstructionism. It is a principled defence of the original 2009 benefit-sharing agreement and a warning against repeating the mistakes that have kept communities waiting for nearly two decades.

The 2009 agreement was explicit. Landowners and five provincial governments were to acquire shares from the State. The government borrowed to make that possible because the beneficiaries lacked assets and borrowing capacity. O’Neill, who was part of those decisions, has never hidden this history. He has stated plainly that the free carry was only 2 per cent; the rest was paid for through loans that the State ultimately serviced. When capacity constraints became obvious, the 2015 Cabinet adjustment lowered the price. That was pragmatic governance, not a giveaway.

Now that the loans have been repaid and shares can be disseminated, O’Neill insists on two things: a clear public announcement that this is a free gifting, and the immediate removal of political control from the SPV. His reasoning is straightforward. The agreement was never between the national government and itself. Multiple parties signed it. Politics should not be used to manipulate landowners and provincial governments who have already endured years of delay and broken expectations.

The risk is real. An SPV that holds and manages significant equity on behalf of resource owners becomes a powerful instrument. If national politicians retain effective control or influence over its board, finances, and decisions, the equity risks becoming another centralised lever rather than a direct transfer of ownership and autonomy. Landowners and provincial governments deserve to manage their own financial affairs. Anything less turns hard-won paper ownership into continued dependency.

O’Neill has been consistent on this point. He supports greater landowner and provincial ownership. He simply refuses to accept that the vehicle delivering those benefits should remain entangled with the same political class that has historically struggled to translate resource wealth into sustained local development. His call for the five provincial governments and landowners to handle the finances themselves is the logical completion of the 2009 framework, not a new demand.

PNG’s extractive sector has repeatedly shown that national political oversight of landowner funds tends to produce opacity, patronage, and grievance rather than broad-based progress. O’Neill’s position cuts against that pattern. By insisting on a clean handover and genuine independence for the SPV, he offers a practical way to honour past agreements and reduce the distrust that continues to surround LNG benefits.

The government should accept this advice without hesitation. Announce the gifting clearly. Remove politicians from the SPV’s management. Let the rightful owners take control of what is theirs. After seventeen years, anything short of that is simply more of the same.