Landowner factions likely to clash over PMIZ development plans

By Patrick Matbob

 PNG government’s determination to push ahead with the development of the Pacific Marine Industrial Zone is likely to cause a clash amongst landowners if outstanding issues are not adequately addressed.

Minister for Trade, Commerce and Industry Richard Maru has been talking with a faction of the landowner group that has instigated court proceedings to halt the project,

Entrance to the PMIZ project area that remains undeveloped.

but has not included the landowner umbrella companies set up under the Somare regime.

The two umbrella companies, Rehamb and KIL, have questioned Maru’s meetings with the landowner faction represented by plaintiffs Frank Don, Francis Gem and Bager Wamm. Chairmen of Rehamb and KIL Alfonse Miai and Rudolf Aiyu want to know what sorts of benefits have been given by the government to the three plaintiffs. The umbrella companies threatened not to support the project if the government ignored their existence. They said that Maru had ignored them in a December meeting and only met with the plaintiffs. They have instead called for an open dialogue with all landowners.

The project which the O’Neal government has decided last year to develop as a general industrial zone to cater for other economic activities with tuna as the underwriter, has been stalled by a court case taken out by a faction of landowners opposing its development.

Minister Maru has met with the three plaintiffs and asked them to set aside the court case and renegotiate the PMIZ deal. Maru has also arranged for the group to be taken to General Santos City in Philippines to see how a similar special economic zone project is run.

Maru believes the landowners have been misled by ‘environmentalists and greenies’ about the pollution that would be created by marine park.

“We want to prove to them that there is no such thing. We want them to look at big marine parks, like the one in the Philippines,” he said.

This will be a second trip of landowners to Philippines. In 2009, another group of landowners were taken to Philippines and the experience changed the views of all but one of the member to support the project. The lone group member opposing the project, Francis Gem, is one of the plaintiffs in the recent court case.

Meanwhile, Maru has announced that a France fishing company Sapmer-Piriou Joint Venture has been engaged to develop the project and will spend US$500 million to build a 300m long fisheries wharf, a value-added tuna processing facility, a 400m dry dock and a shipyard.

He said the project was significant because it would allow duty-free access into the European Union market for PNG canned tuna and tuna loins and create 2,500 jobs.

He said the company would also build the country’s first shipbuilding yard.

One of plaintiffs, Frank Don, said recently that they were prepared to ‘shelve’ the court case if the project was renegotiated to ensure that it benefited all the people in the project area and not just few landowner leaders.

He also said that they (plaintiffs) realised that the PMIZ land has become state land and therefore, the government had the right to develop it. He said however that they were concerned that the project would have a negative impact on the local people who still lived a subsistence lifestyle. He said the people have to be empowered so that they can be able to live with and benefit from the changes that would affect them.