14 clans back Solwara 1

By AGNES FIFI UKI
THE 14 clans of west coast central in New Ireland want Canadian sea-bed mining company, Nautilus Minerals, to continue its Solwara 1 project in the Bismarck Sea.
They have threatened to take the go­vernment to court after Nautilus decided to stop developing its mining equipment because it had been at loggerheads with the government over some issues for about six months.
The clans opposed the closing down of Nautilus’ Port Moresby and Kavieng offices and declared their support for the company to continue working in PNG.
A spokesman for the clans and leader of the Bares clan, Buarang Vaiimuru, said leaders of the 14 clans agreed that Nautilus should go ahead with developing the seabed poly metallic sulphide deposit.
“These 14 clans around the west coast central New Ireland, who own a substantial amount of shoreline, in a meeting on Sept 15 agreed for Nautilus to carry out deep-sea mining in
the area and approved its first project – Solwara 1,” Vaiimuru said.
He said their clans would be impacted the most by the development and they wanted people, who opposed the project and claimed the mining would destroy the environment and fish stocks, to verify their claims.  
He said they were not happy with Northern Governor Gary Juffa’s claims in the media and his opposition
to the first deep-sea project in the world.
“This is the first underwater project in the world and we, the people from west coast central New Ireland, wish to be part of it and to benefit from it,” Vaiimuru said.
“We also plan to request the government that we source an offshore loan to facilitate our 30% equity in the operations of Nautilus on Solwara 1 to 12 in the Bismarck Sea and to take up 30% patent rights in the project.”
He said west coast central was one of the most underdeveloped areas in New Ireland.
The 14 clan leaders said they did not want any logging operations in the area.