No one is above the law…except Gari Baki!

If you’ve already made the assumption that this article is about the brutalising of the child by special police in Kimbe, West New Britain – you are, in part, correct, but only in part.  Because, with Baki as the Chief of the RPNGC the buck stops ultimately with him- he is responsible for the behaviour of his thugs.

If that were the only thing Baki were guilty of, it would be enough, but his role in this affair has been far less passive than just assumed responsibility. He may not have delivered the blows that injured the child, but he did (allegedly) directly and corruptly set up the circumstances that led to it – a far more active and direct involvement. But first…

The Brutalising of the boy

Papua New Guinea and her neighbours watched in horror as a video was released last week of a brutal police attack on a young boy. Although the attack had happened some weeks prior, at the time, it was proving difficult to find out what had happened with (apparently?) no records at the police station nor at the hospital of the incident. It was as if it had never happened.

So, was he dead or alive? (Yes, the attack was that vicious.)

But evidence as explicit and unequivocal as a video is too strong to ignore. People could be identified and it wasn’t long before those involved were recognised. The outcry was loud and far-reaching.

And so the Kimbe Police Chief’s memory miraculously returned: he was a sixteen-year-old who was involved in a robbery and had tried to rape a two-year-old.

Truth is, according to the family of the boy, he is thirteen years old and was an innocent passer by who had committed no crime at all – let alone the very serious accusations the police have been throwing at him.

What the police are alleging makes no sense: why, if he were such a heinous criminal, did the police deny knowledge of his arrest until circumstances meant they could no longer persist in the bare-faced lie?

Well, this may explain it.

Baki’s personal army

The Kimbe Police Chief has confirmed that the perpetrators of the attack were police officers hand-picked by Commissioner Gari Baki sent to Kimbe for a particular reason – a reason he was not willing to talk about. There were eight of them sent to Kimbe.

The eight were housed by the Police Commissioner in his residence at Ganeboku Village and furnished with two 10-seater vehicles for their transportation – a luxury for a police station which rarely has fuel for cars to go out to investigate major assaults on women and which frequently runs out of food to feed those in custody.

So what sort of “special investigation” would warrant such expenditure by the PNG government? It must be really serious right?

Wrong!

Gari Baki had sent in these heavy-handed thugs to stop a meeting of a company that, up until then, his family had controlled. With the death of his brother, William Garey, who was Chairman of the Board, he was afraid the meeting would mean his family would lose control of the company – especially as some anomalies had been noticed under his brother’s Chairmanship. What would a newly-controlled board uncover?

No, this was not police business, this was the strong arming and violent coercion of shareholders using government resources with the contingent headed up by the son of William Garey and the nephew of Gari Baki, Steven Garey.

Their task was to secure control of the Kavugar Development Corporation for the Baki/Garey family in order to protect them against answering some very awkward questions – like why no annual returns since 2009 and to continue what William Garey had started – whatever that was. The shareholders had different ideas.

But it can’t be such a large task for eight, elite, armed police to hold up a meeting – and in the interim the devil makes work for idle hands – especially such vicious ones as those of the police that beat the boy. It seems that the beating was just something to do in their down time.

Kavugar Development Corporation

…is a company that owns an palm-oil plantation. It has ten individual shareholders and one company shareholder.

All individual shareholders come from the village of Ganeboku.

There is only one shareholder who is also a director – he is James Raka (assuming James Raka and James Dau Raka is the same person – the confusion comes because the Independent Promotion Authority (IPA) says he’s not a director yet lists him as one.)

In 2007, William Garey was appointed as Chairman. William Garey is the brother of Gari Baki, COP.

Recently William died – and so the struggle for control of the company began – the Baki family using police resources to physically force their agenda – including and especially the deployment of the eight, hand-picked officers from Port Moresby to stop their opposition holding a legitimate meeting.

Alois Lavu, who was a director of KDC until 2007 and its secretary from 1994 (the companies inception?) and 2002, commented on a social media posting discussing the police brutality and the ‘special situation’ warranting the police deployment:

“I am an elder of the village and I categorically deny any situation exist in the village that warrant the deployment of this unit from Port Moresby. All we did was to call a special meeting of our shareholders to rectify anomalies that existed in our Company KDCL. I ask is that a crime?? We had 4 weeks of this rubbish. Nothing but harassment, intimidation and wrongful detention.”

What sort of “anomalies” existed to warrant such a heavy-handed approach to this commercial matter?

Notwithstanding the meeting that Mr Lavu was speaking of being stopped, another meeting did occur. It was attended by three out of the four remaining directors and without the company secretary. It was held at the late William Garey’s residence on 25 June, 2018 (all according to IPA records).

Gari Baki (notwithstanding that he’s neither a shareholder nor a director) gave the welcoming speech and assured everyone that he had sought legal advice to ascertain the legitimacy of the meeting.

In this meeting, Baki’s son, George Baki, was nominated as a director and was later to become Chairman. Three bank accounts were consolidated into one and signatories were changed to include: Victor Tua, Herman Pinda (both who had become directors at the same time as the now deceased brother of Gari Baki, William Garey) together with James Raka and Gari Baki’s son, George.

This was all registered with the IPA on 12 July and signed off by Sharmaine Baki.

It is a moot point whether this meeting was indeed legitimate – and I do believe that there is a legal challenge.

Gari Baki needs to get his thugs out of Kimbe and attend to his personal affairs in a professional and courteous way without using the state’s resources as if PNG is his personal fiefdom – and, in the meantime, breaking all the laws he’s been commissioned to uphold

I wonder what you have to hide, Mr Baki, that warranted bringing in thugs that would brutalise a child just for their own recreation?