The Censorship Ambassador School Program (CASP), initiated in 2021, was officially launched at the Holiday Inn Hotel in Port Moresby on Tuesday, 30th of July, 2024. According to Chief Censor, Mr. Jim Abani, CASP is a behavior change intervention program initiated in 2021 by the Office of Censorship through its Awareness and Publicity Branch under the Strategic Policy & Coordination Division. CASP is more impact-driven which is designed specifically for secondary school student leaders from grades 9 to 12 in the country, he said. This program came out from the general school awareness programs that were carried out by the Office since 2014 to educate and inform students about the roles of the office and the practice of moral censorship in the country.
Mr. Abani acknowledged his key stakeholder, the National Department of Education, through the leadership of Secretary, Dr. Uke Kombra for the continued support and partnership in the implementation of censorship programs in schools in the country, while at the same time acknowledging other important partners both from the government and non-government organizations who were present to witness the official launching.
“Office of Censorship itself cannot move this forward, thus we value your partnership to get us to where we aspire to be in terms of delivering our mandated duties as required by Law,” Mr. Abani said.
The Censorship Ambassador School Program was introduced in 2021 and has since been rolled out to selected secondary schools in Port Moresby, Central, Autonomous Region of Bougainville, and East New Britain. This time going forward, the manual guide launched on Tuesday will be used in guiding the training of the students on the roles and responsibilities of the censorship office and most importantly the core values of the office. These core values include commitment, professionalism, service, integrity, ethics, gender equality, and social inclusion, Mr. Abani added.
National Department of Education, First Assistant Secretary for Guidance and Counselling, Mr. Philip So’on officially launched CASP on behalf of the Department Secretary, Dr. Uke Kombra. In his keynote address, Mr. So’on emphasized the importance of CASP being integrated into the school systems of the country. He conveyed a message from the Education Secretary, Dr. Kombra to the Chief Censor that the Office of Censorship has to work with the Guidance and Counseling Officers as well as secondary school inspectors in the provinces to implement school programs.
“There is a need to have these programs in our school systems, therefore, a collaboration between the Office of Censorship, provincial guidance counselors, and secondary school inspectors will see this through.”
He further added that this was to ensure the CASP program is institutionalized and monitored by the guidance officers. He suggested having training or sessions with the guidance officers for program sustenance.
Mr. So’on emphasized on more partnership and collaboration between stakeholders and the National Department of Education to reach the 2.2 million students of Papua New Guinea.