Marape lays down the rules

HELA Transitional Authority (HTA) chairman James Marape wants individual landowner companies to support a single big company that is representative of the vast majority of people.
Marape, who is Education Minister and acting Sports Minister, said this on Wednesday at the signing of a joint venture agreement between Hides Gas Resource Ltd and international firm, Bruniel International, at the Hideaway Hotel.
The JV between HGRL and Bruniel will be focusing on human resource development and recruitment in the construction phase of the LNG project.
“We have more than 1,000 landowner companies registered with Commerce and Industry for the seed capital and many are with just a paper (company certificate) running around to access funding,” Marape said.
“You can get one-off seed capital but you cannot succeed unless you have a sound business structure in place.”
Marape said he discouraged single individual companies but for landowners to come together under one single company that represents all the landowner interest.
“You can get K10,000, K50,000 or K100,000 today but it will be gone tomorrow to the creditors and pokies.”
Marape said while all Southern Highlanders were landowners and had the right to start their own companies, he encouraged them to stand together under one strong company to reap benefits in the future.
He said smaller individual landowner companies getting K5,000 or K10,000 from the seed money was not enough to build capacity to compete in the contracts.
Marape encourage the people to form one big company and enter into joint venture arrangements with reputable international firms that would build their profile and get business contracts with project developers.
“I will support a landowner company that involves the vast majority as shareholders and not individual or family companies,” Marape said.