Youths arrested for stopping logging on conservation area
By Grace Tiden, Post Courier
Twelve youths from Bairaman in the Ralopal Concession area under the Sigete/Mukus Special Agriculture and Business Lease (SABL) Project Site in East New Britain have been arrested and charged for allegedly threatening logging company workers.
The 12 men have appeared for mention at the Kokopo District and were supposed to appear again yesterday for hearing to commence but the case was deferred to a later date.
Papua New Guinea (PNG) is the latest known victim in a modern era of land grabs orchestrated by foreign corporations according to an investigative report and a film, On Our Land, released today by the Oakland Institute and the Pacific Network on Globalisation (PANG) on behalf of PNG partners Act Now! and Birmarck Ramu Group.
Source: Joel Simo* writing in the Sydney Morning Herald
To visiting Australians, my home, the island nation of Vanuatu, is either paradise or a Third World backwater. Holidaymakers prize our beaches and clear waters. But workers from aid organisations such as AusAID see limited employment opportunities and poverty.
Both groups have ideas for "improving" Vanuatu through holiday homes, tourism and a commercial track to "development", including the establishment of Western-style property rights.
The Indigenous communities of Collingwood Bay, Papua New Guinea are engaged in a high stakes battle to defend their land and culture from the threat of Conflict Palm Oil expansion and they have a quick and easy request for help right now.
Community advocacy group ACT NOW! says the Prime Minister's response to the huge illegal SABL grab is weak and inadequate.
The government has announced a ministerial committee to review the recommendations and findings of a Commission of Inquiry into Special Agriculture and Business Leases but has done nothing to cancel the fraudulent leases or stop the illegal logging in leases areas.
The government says the review will be executed by the Department of Lands, National Forest Authority and Department of Agriculture.
Papua New Guinea’s government has appointed a ministerial committee to review the recommendations and findings by the Commission of Inquiry into the Special Agriculture and Business Leases.
The Prime Minister Peter O’Neill, speaking on Radio FM100, said the committee has been given two months to complete a review.
He said Government agencies such as the Department of Lands and Physical Planning, Forestry, and the Department of Agriculture and Livestock will execute the review.
FRUSTRATION has build up for landowners in Turubu LLG whose land has been the subject of Special Agriculture Business Lease (SABL) in East Sepik Province.
Photo: Landowners gathering in Mundawin village for the meeting to put pressure on relevant authorities to give back their land title on portion 144c in Turubu LLG in East Sepik on Monday. Pihoto: JIMMY KALEBE.
