The chairman of Australian miner RTG, Michael Carrick, says he's delighted to finally get a chance to put a proposal on re-opening the Panguna mine to the Bougainville Government.
RTG, with landowner group Osikaiang, is one of the companies vying to secure the Panguna licence but it has previously been strongly criticised by the president of the autonomous Papua New Guinea region, John Momis.
He said two years ago that RTG were speculators, that they had no money, and no access to the geological data on the mine.
But Mr Carrick says it was Mr Momis who asked his company and the landowners to meet with him and members of his executive council and present their proposal for the development of the mine.
Don Wiseman asked Mr Carrick how the meeting went.
Transcript
MICHAEL CARRICK: The meeting went for three hours and had a really stimulating question and answer at which I comprehensively addressed every question that was put to the landowners and RTG.
DON WISEMAN: You had all these government ministers there. What was their response?
MC: The comments that were made to me after the presentation is that the ministers were impressed with the detail of our past mining and development expertise, the management team at RTG has developed seven mines in five different countries and won 44 awards for those mines. And secondly we have project financed all those mines and raised the debt and equity for all those seven previous mines from the global capital markets. And the second point the ministers made to me was how impressed they were with the depth and access to the global capital markets.
DW: So you have made an offer to the the ABG [Autonomous Bougainville Government]. What's the nature of that?
MC: Well that's confidential in nature Don but the conclusion of the meeting was that the ABG would continue their dialogue with the landowners to find a common solution and lasting and meaningful solution to Panguna, which I saw as very positive. I am not talking about RTG but just simply that the landowners and the ABG are working closely to resolve the situation.
DW: So you are confident that eventually, RTG, with its landowner group, is going to end up being able to mine at Panguna.
MC: No Don. I wish I could say that but no. I think for the first step, and what I am thrilled with, is a dialogue between the ABG and the landowners. RTG has been the only project proponent from the outset to say that all stakeholders should be consulted and a comprehensive negotiation to achieve a lasting and meaningful resolution to the Panguna issue.
DW: In terms of the [planned] changes to the Mining Act, did the ABG talk about tossing out that idea.
MC: There was little discussion with respect to changing the Mining Act but I think there is a growing understanding that these are draconian in nature, they contravene the most pre-eminent and important principle of mining, which is prior and informed consent of landowners. They remove the customary ownership of minerals. They remove all the specific statuary benefits of landowners, including fees, rents, royalties, levies and interest granted under the existing Bougainville Mining Act. And of course the landowners lose their right to ten percent equity in the project. So it is a comprehensive rewrite of an act that took seven years to work through. So it is important and that's why it's been referred to the legislative committees to review and consider and study carefully.
DW: But all in all a positive trip to Port Moresby for you?
MC: Well we just really appreciated the opportunity to resent our credentials to the ABG and we really expressed our sincere thanks to President Momis for arranging for all his ministers to attend that because they extremely busy with referendum discussions, so it was greatly appreciated. I think it would be fair to say both sides learnt a lot more of each others position
