Plaintiff blasts O’Neill

National, Normal
Source:

The National, Thursday January 30th, 2014

 PRINCIPAL plaintiff  Pr Steven Bagari has described Prime Minister Peter O’Neill’s response on the Ok Tedi court ruling as “totally false and misleading”.

The National Court last Friday ruled in favour of the case by 

Bagari and six other plaintiffs and issued orders, among others, for Ok Tedi Mining Limited (OTML) to refrain from dumping mine waste and tailings into the Ok Tedi and Fly River system pending hearing of the substantive matter next month.

“We have been fooled for 30 years and will not be fooled anymore and not by Peter O’Neill,” Bagari said in a statement yesterday.

“I want to ask why has the prime minister expropriated all our assets and funds in the PNG Sustainable Development Program takeover and placed himself as the sole authority who decides who will receive compensation and by how much and when and where.

“That is clearly the only effect of the Mining (Ok Tedi Tenth Supplemental) Act he introduced and passed in Parliament in September 2013.

“If the prime minister was honestly attending to the environmental issues why is he allowing the Ok Tedi mine to continue discharging toxic mine waste and tailings into the Ok Tedi- Fly River system after 30 years?

“He should have shut it,  then address the genuine issues such as cleaning up the Fly River and attend to the serious health ,nutritional and water contamination issues the over 100,000 people face every day.”