DEVELOPMENT
JOURNALISM 'PNG-STYLE' AND THE RAMU NICKEL MINE PROJECT INFORMATION WAR

Prominent Papua New Guinean journalist, columnist and journalism teacher Kevin Pamba has himself become the news over the Ramu nickel mine controversy. Aid activists allege he is too close to mining interests and claim he was involved in an "interview" incident where a landowner opponent of the mine was assaulted in Madang.

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Viewpoint: JOURNALISM PNG-STYLE

by Julian King: 8 November 2005

Source: PNGSA@yahoogroups.com

WHAT would you do if you were a journalist and you were conducting this interview? Five minutes into the interview a car drives up and five men get out of the car approach you and the person you are interviewing. They ask the man you are interviewing his name - when he responds - the five men are angry and start calling him names - they call him names because they take an opposite view to the one the person you are interviewing takes

The five men then tell the person you are interviewing to get into the car. He refuses. They continue to abuse him finally picking him up and forcing him to get into the car. When they get the man in the car they continue to abuse him and they threaten his life. You, the journalist witness all this. It unfolds right in front of your eyes. You didn't have to go looking for the story - the story came to you.You think you got yourself quite a story don't you?

Not if you're in Papua New Guinea and not if your name is Kevin Pamba. This unbelievable scenario played itself out last Tuesday [1 November 2005] in Madang Province, PNG. To make it even more unbelievable, Pamba got in the vehicle and witnessed all the events that took place. Before we continue, let's back up.

On the Tuesday morning, Simon Warr, a landowner from the Rai Coast had scheduled a meeting with Kevin Pamba, a journalist writing for the National newspaper in PNG. Pamba is also a journalism lecturer at Divine Word University (DWU).

Simon Warr wanted to talk to Pamba about the landowner's views of the proposed Ramu Nickel Mine. The previous day (October 31), Pamba had written a column that carried a pro mine bias. Simon Warr is a spokesperson for those landowners who are questioning the mine and its plan to dump 100 million tons of waste into their bay. Simon Warr was mentioned in the column.

Pamba had painted Simon and his views in a less than flattering light. A time was agreed upon and at 9am Simon met Kevin Pamba at the DWU library. The two meet as scheduled and five minutes into the interview the five men approached the journalist and Simon.

The story unfolds as described above. Simon Warr is now in the vehicle with five hostile men and Kevin Pamba. They drive around Madang with the five men both physically and verbally abusing Warr. They eventually drive to the Madang headquarters of Highlands Pacific Ltd. - the proposed mine developer, which recently entered into an agreement with the Chinese government-sponsored China Metallurgical and Construction Corporation (MCC) to develop the mine.

When arriving at Highlands Pacific the men got out of the car with Simon. While at the Highlands Pacific HQ Simon was bashed, his life threatened and he was told to retract his statements against the mine. Simon Warr refused.

During this time Kevin Pamba also contributed to Simon Warr's ordeal by telling him he was really causing a lot of trouble by opposing the mine. After over an hour of more abuse, threats and bashing everyone got back into the car, including the journalist and headed back to Divine Word University where the interview began nearly two hour before.

Simon Warr got out of the car with Kevin Pamba. Steven Saud, chairman of the Coastal Pipeline Landowners Association, accompanied them. Saud and a David Tigavu the chairperson from the Kurumbukari were the apparent insitgators in the ordeal with Tigavu threatening Simon's life on several occasions.

And how did Kevin Pamba write this up two days later? He took the side of the kidnappers, those who threatened the life of a man - making it appear in the article as if Simon Warr had been at fault and mentioning that some of the landowners "roughed-up" Warr.

When contacted by an Australian-based investigator on November 3, Pamba admitted he had witnessed the kidnap and assault but was vague on the details while HP manager Andrew Semi admitted that an incident had occurred at the HP office and that Warr had been "released" after a number of hours detention.

So what is Pamba's story? Simon Warr's friends and relatives think Kevin set Warr up. It is certainly not beyond the realm of possibility. When trying to figure it all out one must take into consideration that Pamba works for the National newspaper.

The National is owned by the Malaysian logging giant Rimbunan Hijau. Most people in PNG know this and refer to the National as the "Daily Log".

Whatever the reason, this event has been an embarrassment for journalism. We who still believe in the integrity of the media everywhere are disheartened by this story.

If this story had come from Australia rather than PNG, we could expect swift action, but in PNG one never knows. Kevin Pamba has been reported to the PNG Media Council. The Media Council acknowledged they received the complaint and would be looking into it. We'll see what they come up with.

In the meantime Kevin Pamba will still be teaching journalism to students at Divine Word University!

Post-Courier version of the attack on Simon Warr, 8 November 2005

Pacific Media Watch report, 8 November 2005

Kevin Pamba a day earlier in The National, 7 November 2005:

Viewpoint: INFO DRIVE ON RAMU NICKEL PROJECT SOON

By Kevin Pamba

PUBLIC information sessions on the rich Ramu nickel project are expected to be held in Madang soon to prevent any misinformation and misunderstanding among the people about the project.

This would be the second time since the extensive awareness campaigns were carried out in 1999 by project proponents, Highlands Pacific Ltd.

The Department of Mining was expected to lead the new awareness campaign along with project partners to remind the people once again about the project and its implication.

In the 1999 campaign, over 60 information sessions were held in Madang town and in different locations in the province and at the national and government levels in Port Moresby.

A session was also held with a group of PNG journalists who visited the length of the project’s impact areas.

They visited the proposed mine site at Kurumbukari, the pipeline route and the refinery site and township at Basamuk Bay.

The extensive awareness campaigns were carried out in preparation for government approval of the project development and environmental plans. These approvals were granted by 2001.

The new information campaign was being organised because of the time gap of nearly seven years in which some people may have forgotten the information.

The Ramu Nickel and Southern Highlands-to-Queensland gas pipeline projects are two multi-million kina investments the Somare Government had been working hard to get off the ground to help bolster the economy.

The National editorial, 3 November 2005:

Editorial: BEWARE HIDDEN AGENDAS

IT is all too easy for people to be manipulated.

Papua New Guineans are becoming used to the sort of behind-the-scenes trickery that has become common in their country, where others of their number are used by hidden interests to further dubious agendas.

These agendas are often in direct opposition to developments and projects that are clearly in the interests of the people, and of the nation.

It is most obvious in the resource area of our economy.

There have been many examples of development proposals in PNG that have been smeared by false rumour and outright lies.

In some cases, investments worth tens of millions of kina have been re-routed to other countries with more realistic vision.

It is a relatively easy matter for the experienced anti-development lobby to inflame rural landowners so that they will bitterly oppose a prospective investment on their land.

PNG governments in the past have occasionally proved powerless to change the opinions of landowners wrongly influenced by other interests.

A recent scenario being played out in the Ramu area of the Madang province is an instructive case in point.

The PNG government has been particularly thorough in its approach to the Ramu nickel landowners.

There has been a real determination to avoid the kind of last minute delays and accompanying uncertainties that have occurred in other parts of the country under similar circumstances.
Consultation has been lengthy and exhaustive.

Issues associated with this potentially giant project have been repeatedly discussed with the landowners, and with all the affected communities in the area.

But in recent weeks, one voice has been raised in protest against this huge project, now poised on the very brink of being realised.

That voice has claimed to represent the majority of landowners in the Ramu nickel area, and has expressed strident opposition to the development proposals.

A number of legitimate landowner spokesman voiced their anger as soon as the matter became public.

Expensive full page advertisements appeared in other PNG newspapers, allegedly from this individual on behalf of his community.

Legitimate landowners have since issued a statement of their own fully supporting the development of Ramu nickel, and denying that the protesting individual is acting as a "spokesman for the people".

They emphasised that the government and the people had been engaged in a process of consultation that had led to the signing of an initial agreement in 2001.

No credible anti-development voices have been raised since that date.

Landowners have questioned why this person did not speak out in 2001, and why he has remained silent until the end of 2005, when the project is nearing realisation.

It now appears that the individual has admitted that his stance has been on behalf of other so far unrevealed persons.

Where investors seek to deviously outwit the laws of PNG, The National will always be in the vanguard of those determined to reveal and abort their dubious projects.

But where such investments are clearly in the interests of the whole nation, and can bring hundreds of millions of desperately needed kina into the public coffers for the direct benefit of the people, we will throw our weight behind them.

The preparation for the Ramu Nickel Project has been undertaken in comprehensive detail, and no attempt appears to have been made to misrepresent the nature or the extent of the development.

We all need to remember that many of these large resource projects are sited in rural and often remote areas.

These are locations where there is virtually no other possibility of providing development and a better way of life for the people.

Those who allow themselves to be deluded into opposing legitimate and thoroughly researched developments are threatening the future of this country.

And in the process of pursuing the shadowy plans of faceless people, they are allowing themselves to be used as pawns in somebody else's chess game.

Land in this country belongs to the people.

It is their voice expressed through their authentic representatives that must be acted upon when developments are planned.

We urge our people to assess the value of proposed investments for themselves, and not be seduced by the bat-squeak of anti-development and anti-government lobbies.

* Techa Beaumont, Mineral Policy Institute: advocacy@mpi.org.au