Incumbent president of the PNG Chamber of Mines and Petroleum Anthony Smaré retained his position as President at the Chamber’s Annual General Meeting.
Smaré was re-elected unopposed in the Chambers 34th Annual General Meeting held on Thursday 28th of April at the Hilton Hotel Port Moresby.
Smaré in 2021 had become the Mining, Oil and Gas industry’s first non-affiliated president, and independent of all the member companies that make up the Chamber’s membership.
Richard Kassman of TotalEnergies EP PNG Limited also retained his position as Senior Vice President, with Philip Samar of K92 Mining Limited joining the Council as Vice President.
Council members for the year 2022 include:
- John Lewins (K92),
- Albert Kaupa Tobe (Ramu-Nico, MCC),
- Kepas Wali (Harmony Gold),
- Stanley Komunt (Newcrest Limited),
- Hitesh Lal (ExxonMobil PNG),
- Tim Richards (GeoPacific Resource),
- Mark McMonagle (Sun Engineering),
- Andrew Harris (Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu).
At the AGM, which was attended by representative of member companies in person and via videoconference from all over the world, Smaré recounted the work that the chamber and industry had done over the past 12 months. He highlighting in particular the significant work that the industry did in managing the COVID pandemic so that it did not disrupt important resource operations that the economy required, but also in supporting COVID-19 responses in their remote communities and providing invaluable assistance to the national government’s COVID management and resourcing activities.
Smaré acknowledged the work that the chamber and industry had done in continuing positive engagement with the National Government and stakeholders on policy reform and implementation.
Smaré also thanked the outgoing councilors: John Chambers (Santos), Johannes Van Heerdan (Harmony) and Craig Jones (Newcrest) for their contributions. He also thanked outgoing Senior Vice President Leon Buskens for his stellar service and leadership, but reiterated that he hopes to see Buskens, as a senior Papua New Guinean leader in the industry, take up another leadership position in the Council later this year.
