Sir Brown wants assets transferred

Business
Source:
The National, Monday July 11th, 2016

KUMUL Mineral Holdings Limited (KMHL) chairman Sir Brown Bai has asked for the immediate transfer of the State’s mineral assets to the entity.
Sir Brown made the statement during a recent event to mark the change of name from Petromin Holdings Limited to KMHL.
“Kumul Minerals (KMHL) currently only owns one portion of investment in Solwara 1,” Sir Brown said.
“To move forward, we have to make sure that we actually can take on other State assets as well in that field. And in particular I am talking about Bougainville Copper, and Ok Tedi.
“We will need those assets to be transferred, so that we can build up a solid balancing and move forward to undertake other investments that the Government has a mandated us to undertake through the legislations. That is my appeal.”
KMHL is one of the three Kumul entities that were created by Government under its policy of consolidation of its mineral assets, petroleum assets and assets that are held by State-owned entities, under three distinct entities.
The other two Kumul entities, Kumul Petroleum Holdings Limited (KPHL) and Kumul Consolidated Holdings Limited (KCHL), came into operation last year. Petromin was incorporated in 2007, as a private corporation under the company’s Act and then the Petromin PNG Authorisation Act 2007, which gave certain authorities including the authority to hold minerals and petroleum interests on behalf of the State.
Meanwhile, KMHL’s Eda Oil Limited would soon be moved to KPHL following a recent signing of a share sale agreement between the two entities.
KMHL managing director Thomas Abe had said they (KMHL) were actually transferring two assets – Eda Oil and Eda Oil’s subsidiary Kumul LNG.