Enga Governor Sir Peter Ipatas welcomed parties to the Porgera Mining Project Community Development Agreement (CDA), to the Enga Teachers’ College in Wabag yesterday where they will be negotiating benefits that are expected out of the new Porgera Mine.
The parties are the State, Special Mining Lease (SML) landowners, Enga Provincial Government, New Porgera Limited (NPL) and the Porgera Rural Local Level Government.
In his welcome remarks, Sir Ipatas appealed to the parties to be fair, be understanding of each other, and make efforts to reach consensus on benefits so that they could start receiving benefits.
He told the landowners that in order to start receiving benefits, they had to agree and sign the CDA, as it was the process by which benefits would be negotiated and distributed.
Mine derived benefits that come from the government such as equity, Business Development Grants (BDG) and Infrastructure Development Grants (IDG) are budgeted for under an agreed CDA.
Sir Ipatas said Porgera mine had already commenced operations, adding that if the parties did not sign the CDA sooner, landowners could miss out on contracts and business-spin-off opportunities. He told the parties not to prolong the CDA process.
The Governor appealed to the National Government to be considerate of the aspirations of the Lease for Mining Purposes (LMP) landowners, the Riverine impact communities to be a party to the agreement.