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PORT MORESBY - Papua New Guinea's parliament elected veteran leader Michael Somare as Prime Minister for a second consecutive five-year term on Monday.
A coalition of parties led by Somare's National Alliance party secured 86 votes in the 109-seat Parliament, defeating a rival group led by former prime minister Julius Chan and Somare's former treasurer Bart Philemon.
Somare, 71, was Papua New Guinea's first prime minister at independence in 1975 and has now won the position four times.
His victory came six weeks after voting started in Papua New Guinea, a Pacific nation of about 6 million people with vast mineral resources but where most people live subsistence lives in villages.
Somare's re-election will do little to help his country thaw the frosty relationship with its biggest aid donor Australia, which provides more than A$350 million ($302 million) a year in aid to its nearest neighbour.
Somare had accused Australia of meddling in the election after Canberra called on PNG to release a secret report into how lawyer Julian Moti, wanted in Australia on child sex charges, escaped PNG to the Solomon Islands on a PNG defence force plane.
Somare has refused to release the report and denies he was involved in Moti's escape, but local media said the report blames Somare and recommends the prime minister face charges. Moti has since been appointed Attorney-General in the Solomon Islands.
Police fearing violent protests set up road blocks around Port Moresby on Monday, forcing protesters to abandon plans to march on Parliament House. Australia had updated its travel advisory to warn citizens of potential violent demonstrations.
Known as the "Father of the Nation", Somare has slowly turned around Papua New Guinea's economic slump, with the economy growing since 2003 after several years of contraction, with gross domestic product growth forecast at 5.5 per cent in 2007.
But Somare has struggled to combat his country's problems with law and order and corruption, or to deliver a better standard of life to his people, with about 40 per cent of the population living on less than $1 a day.
Papua New Guinea is experiencing rapid and sustained population growth, but also has the highest rate of HIV/AIDS, with about 64,000 people, or 2 per cent of the adult population, living with HIV/AIDS.
- REUTERS
