Demand for Ramu review
Published by MAC on 2007-02-05
Demand for Ramu review
5th February 2007
What started as a trickle of concern about minerals "rents" a couple of years is rapidly turning into a fast flow of denunciations of deals forged (primarily during the 1990s) between complaisant governments and rapacious mining companies over the heads - and sometimes bodies - of mining-affected communities.
Added to last week's critiques from Australia and a Tanzanian NGO (weakly backed by the government) the main opposition party in Papua New Guinea has condemend the terms of the Ramu nickel agreement.
And, on January 5, Papua New Guinea's Labour and Industrial Relations Secretary blasted the Chinese company behind the project for innumerable breaches of working standards which, he said, were "far below human standards."