Zapping the Yo-Yo Man: OLIPPAC and the Consolidation of Executive Power in Papua New Guinea

Abstract

In the early years of the new millennium, the Papua New Guinea (PNG) government introduced major reforms intended to promote greater parliamentary stability. The Organic Law on the Integrity of Political Parties and Candidates (OLIPPAC) sought to regulate the post-general election process of selecting prime ministers, increase women’s representation and establish or reinforce the ‘integrity’ of the political order, both in a structural engineering and a moral sense. Most controversially, it aimed to regulate member of parliament (MP) votes on the floor of parliament so as to discourage defections on issues of confidence and to tie pro-government MPs to prime ministers.