Early LNG works halted

Main Stories, National
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By ANDREW ALPHONSE

ANGRY landowners have forced early works on the multi-billion kina PNG liquefied natural gas (LNG) project in Hides, Tari, Southern Highlands, to a complete standstill for the past five days.
Hides 4 wellhead landowners of petroleum development licence 7 (PDL7) forcefully shut down the construction of early works on the proposed LNG condensation plant site at Para village on the Hides ridge mountains as of 7am last Saturday.
Another group of landowners of the existing Hides 1 wellhead (PDL1) also stopped work on the proposed Yuni LNG Technical College near the Oil Search Ltd’s (OSL) Nogoli base camp (see story on Page 2).
The National visited Hides 4 yesterday and saw machines and equipment, belonging to international contractor Clough Curtain Joint Venture (CCJV) working on the 800ha condensation plant site, lying idle since last Saturday.
The landowners’ uprisings got worse when about 300 CCJV local workmen, including operators and other technical staff, went on strike and walked off their job also last Saturday, complaining about poor working conditions and their welfare. CCJV has being contracted by ExxonMobil, developer of the LNG project, for the early works including engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) stage of the project.
As the machines and equipment remained idle, landowners gave CCJV, ExxonMobil and the state 14 days as of Monday to respond favourably to their demands.
Landowner leader Martin Hape of the Warape clan, who led the protest, said the state and developer must review the agreement signed at 1am at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Port Moresby on May 23, 2008, and include landowners in the signing.
Hape said they had to force the stop-work because they were not seeing any signs of the early benefits as promised in the umbrella agreement (UBSA) signed in May last year in Kokopo and the licenced-based benefits sharing agreement (LBBSA) signed last December.
He said the landowners thought they would participate in spin-off businesses via the use of the promised business development grants (BDG), seed capital and other outstanding Hides memorandum of agreement (MoA) funds.
Hape said Hides 4 landowners also wanted the K15 million BDG for Hides PDL 7 delivered at the project site and not anywhere else.
He said the 5,000 Para villagers affected directly by the construction of the condensation plant demanded that they be properly resettled in the promised H90 houses with good water supply, electricity and other basic government services.
He said the landowners also wanted the release of the accrued benefits of K32.2 million delivered to Kewapi tribes of Hides PDL7 and PDL1 from the K100 million outstanding MoA commitments for Hides. 
He said without these demands being addressed by the state and developer, no work would be allowed on the LNG condensation plant, Hides wellhead and pipeline, access roads and other areas like landfills and quarry.
Some expatriate staff employed by CCJV and ExxonMobil at Hides were approached but they refused to comment, saying they were not allowed.
They referred The National to Esso Highlands (PNG) Ltd country manager Peter Graham in Port Moresby.
Esso Highlands is the subsidiary of ExxonMobil.
The landowners were also advised to raise their concerns with the umbrella landowner company in the LNG project, Hides Gas Development Corporation (HGDC), state and ExxonMobil.