By WATSON GABANA
Tears flowed freely from his tired old eyes.
He stood wobbly supported by a stick looking beyond the range of mountains to the west. He spoke with a voice full of emotion.
"Pikinini! Yu no inap lukim bel bilong. Mi gat bikpela amamas tru. Yu kam long hia long kar. Mi bin driman long wanpela taim, bai mi karap long kar long haus bilong mi stret. Nau dispela driman i kamap tru," (Son! You can't see my heart. I am joyful, you arrived here by car. I've been dreaming of being transported elsewhere from home. Now this is a reality).
Papa Abraham, aged 72, wasn't crying because he'd missed me. I am a foreigner there in his Denegari village. Nor were they tears of sadness for a lost loved one.
His were tears of joy for the new and tangible developments taking place before him. The changes were dreams for decades. Now he was seeing his dreams materialize.
In less then a month a 12 kilometer road linking Kurumbukari to the outside world was built. This road has brought great joy for the 3000 plus inhabitants scattered in little hamlets and hill-top villages along the ridges of Kurumbukari in the Madang province, bordering the Chimbu, to the far north-east and Western highlands in the west.
The road was constructed by the Metallurgical Corporation Company, operating as the Ramu NiCo Management (MCC) Limited.
A road, similar to Okuk Highway's Kassam Pass, with 22 U-turns and more then 20 other small curves descends from the chilly Kurumbukari Mountains into the huge Ramu Valley linking with the Lae/Madang Highway for the first time in more then 100 years.
This Banu/Miavi section of the road will serve as the major development trunk for the huge Ramu Nickel Project. Already, celebrations and partying is ongoing in this unknown world because of the impact of the road on their lives.
"Mi nau ken kirap long hia. Go raun long Madang na kam bek long apinun. Bipo, mi mas wokabaut tripela dei na kamap long haive na go long Madang," Papa Abraham said.
(I now can go to Madang direct from my home and return in the evening. Before, I walked two days to the highway to go to Madang).
Infrastructure development began in August this year with the completion and opening of the Banu Bridge, a 94 meter steel bridge over the Ramu River.
Three weeks later a two-lane road was constructed linking the Kurumbukari camp site with the rest of the world.
Although no formal celebration was sanctioned, the general feeling of joy and happiness was felt among the people.
Villagers, big and small, male and female have their own stories to tell, expressing their satisfaction for what Chinese government is doing for them.
"No government vehicle will travel this road. We'll burn it," Jacob Binovao said accusing the various governments for neglecting them for the past years.
He said that Bundi and the Kurumbukari area have been labeled as "back-page" and "mountain-bag carriers" for so long.
"Now, we are not going to carry mountain bags anymore. We'll jump in a car into town and return in the afternoon," Jacob said.
Ramu NiCo Management is the developer/manager of the Ramu Nickel Project, a lateritic nickel/cobalt deposit to the south of the Ramu River at Kurumbukari in the Usino/Bundi district of Madang province.
The development proposal for the construction include, mining and beneficiation plant in Kurumbukari, construction of a 135 kilometer slurry pipeline, process plant at Basamuk, township development and support of infrastructure construction like roads and bridges.
The project was first discovered in 1960 and feasibility studies completed in late 1990s by Highlands Pacific Limited.
In early 2004 China Metallurgical Group Corporation (MCC) bought into and became developer/manager of the project. MCC Ramu NiCo Ltd will fund the construction of the mine which is estimated at US$838 million. It is a generation long project with sufficient resource identified to support a 40 year operation.
Already, the current generations are benefiting from development phase-1 of the 40-year plus operation.
MCC's Community affairs department is beginning to support sports, spiritual and women development in the mining impact areas. Most of the locals are being employed by ENFI, a sub-contractor of MCC in road and bridge construction work. Locals at Basamuk are being employed in construction and other activities of the company.
"We want to make the landowners feel part of the company and become partners in the development of Ramu Nickel," Jerico Pan, Community affairs officer said.
"We are here to stay. The company in full operation would become one of the world's biggest nickel projects," he said.
Evident to his saying, MCC is currently constructing a three-storey office complex in Madang town. When completed by 2008, it will become one of the major attractions in Madang province. They are also building a permanent steel-post bridge across the Ramu River. The expansion of the road works to accommodate four moving vehicle is continuing between Usino and Banu. Whilst in Basamuk, the township development is shaping up with the construction of the Basamuk Wharf.
These two centers will later be connected by a 135 km slurry pipeline to complete the development equation. Only time will tell how this developments costing millions of kina would be beneficial to the local landowners and the nation of Papua New Guinea.
 

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