Author: Rex

Before we get started some small print: This is (ideally) a weekly update about events in Porgera. Before we get started a few caveats: I’m not in Porgera and I’m only relying on my own knowledge of the valley and open sources. I am not a lawyer. I do my best to keep the dates straight but they may get a day off due to my being in a different time zone than Porgera. Thanks to everyone who sent me links and articles. I’m always interested in hearing more about Porgera if you have information to share. With that out of the way, let’s talk about what has happened since around roughly the 11th of December:

Over at the Post Simon Yandapake is reporting that Porgera will host a law and order forum from 18-20 December.

Big news: On 12 December the Post announced that the long-term compensation agreement has been signed. They report that the LTCA replaces the CCA (consent compensation agreement). The LCA’s signators include representatives of “14 of 15” tenements, including not just Porgera, but also Tari (the power line, presumably). The negotiations began in February, and people signed between 24 November to 5 December. The post reports that “Tieni-Yangua” did not sign, over 94% of landowner agents did. The article is a repackaging of the NPL press release which says the same thing.

Apparently the CDA (or community development agreement) negotiations are still on-going. The National reports on a speech from mine manager James McTieran where he describes the state of the negotiations so far, where issues include: How the landowners and EPG will split a 15% equity in the mine, a 3% royalty (up from 2%), a US$15 million “landowner restart payment” , and Porgera Sustainable Development Fund (soon to be called the PSDF no doubt). According to previous reporting, the CDA was initialed in October and is working its way through the bureaucracy.

Finally, on 12 Dec the Post reported that the Mulitaka bypass road was now open for “light vehicles”

Before we get started some small print: This is a weekly update about events in Porgera. Before we get started a few caveats: I’m not in Porgera and I’m only relying on my own knowledge of the valley and open sources. I am not a lawyer. I do my best to keep the dates straight but they may get a day off due to my being in a different time zone than Porgera. Thanks to everyone who sent me links and articles. I’m always interested in hearing more about Porgera if you have information to share. With that out of the way, let’s talk about what has happened since around roughly the 15th of October:

Apologies for not updating regularly. I was distracted by non-Porgera things.

Not for the first time, Porgera became a topic of national debate, as opposition politicians Chris Havieta (EmTV) and Douglas Tomuriesa argued that Porgera’s situation was a sign of government incompetence.

On 21 Oct it appeared that Mulitaka locals would allow traffic down the bypass road to Porgera that was created after the Mulitaka landslip. There were also plans to allow fuel transfers to resume. The Red Cross/Red Crescent has a status report on Mulitaka as well.

On 22 Oct it was reported that the 62 illegal miners who were arrested earlier were being charged . So that case is moving through the criminal justice system.

On 23 Oct, 6 people were killed and 19 injured in what some on social media call the Sirunki bus massacre. As a result, the SOE is set to expand to four more districts in Enga. SOE staff are liaising with local politicians. There are some reports that this fighting is linked indirectly to the conflict in Porgera because some clans participated in both. I’m still working through the details. This situation is serious enough that PM Marape says he will introduce a domestic terrorism bill to deal with incidents like it.

On the 28th, the Post published another editorial expressing concern about law and order. It included the line: “We must admit that the PNG Police and Army are no match for tribal warriors who have the upper hand in local knowledge of terrain and have experience honed over time in guerrilla type warfare.”

Back in Porgera, on the 28th the Post reported that state-owned houses in Porgera abandoned by fleeing civil servants would be repossessed and repurposed by SOE staff. Simon Yandapake has a nice piece on how the fighting is affecting refugees.

On 30 Oct the Post reported that an NPL employee was killed in Yakenda (near Laiagam) and has details of how this death is related to ongoing conflict.

Nickson Pakea, who represents the Porgera Chamber of Commerce (I am not sure what this organization is) held a press conference in late October arguing that order in Porgera required more than just police repression.

On 1 November the National reported that NPL had resumed operations.

There is a lot more to say — there was a plane crash at Kairik during this period I want to write about. But I just wanted to get this off so I could (try) to get back to a schedule of regular postings about Porgera.

Before we get started some small print: This is a weekly update about events in Porgera. Before we get started a few caveats: I’m not in Porgera and I’m only relying on my own knowledge of the valley and open sources. I am not a lawyer. I do my best to keep the dates straight but they may get a day off due to my being in a different time zone than Porgera. Thanks to everyone who sent me links and articles. I’m always interested in hearing more about Porgera if you have information to share. With that out of the way, let’s talk about what has happened since around roughly the 6th of October:

A major story this week was a conflict at Mulitaka. According to posts on Facebook, it occurred 10 October. Harry Pearl and Harlyne Joku explain what happened in their pice “PNG security forces shoot 6 people, kill 1, near lawless Porgera gold mine“: There was a roadblock at Mulitaka, preventing the passage of “four light vehicles and six 30-seater buses destined for Porgera”. Attackers opened fire and “officers escorting the convoy returned fire, filling one of the gunmen and injuring five”. The convoy reached Porgera, but two vehicles were destroyed and a helipad was damaged. People refer to the vehicles as “Moxys” — off road haul trucks made by the Norwegian company Moxy — but in pictures of them aflame, they say “Komatsu” on the grill. So there’s that. The Facebook posts about this incident agree very strongly with the reporting. I believe this makes Facebook a credible source on this incident (assuming it is not the only source for this article).

According to Pearl and Joku, 62 “illegal miners” were arrested in Porgera. The Post has more details. It appears that SOE personnel are arresting people in the open pit in an effort to deter unauthorized miners. David Manning, the police commissioner, says he still supports Joseph Tondep and has full confidence in his leadership.

This story was also covered on TVWAN, The Post-Courier, The National, a longer piece at the Post-Courier from Miriam Zarriga. David Manning, the police commissioner, says he still supports Joseph Tondep and has full confidence in his leadership. The Post has an op-ed asking “Are we on the cusp of another national crisis?” I am optimistic that this incident is a sign of continuing conflict in the region and not a crisis which is deep in a novel way. But I would say that. I am just finishing up a piece on the renewal of the Porgera Gold Mine arguing that it was not another Bougainville. So I hope I manage to get that published before Porgera becomes another Bougainville, if it does become one.

There are images on Facebook of a memo from James McTiernan, the mine Porgera Mine manager, dated 12 October. In it, McTiernan writes that the mine suspended operations on 11 Oct “due to ongoing disruptions to fuel transfer operations at Mulitaka and illegal roadblocks on the Highlands Highway”. One video on Facebook shows men cutting a pipe in half. One man seems to try to stop another man from continuing the work and a scuffle ensures. This repeats itself with another pair of people. This seems to me legitimate. In the comments of various Facebook posts people argue with each other about whether the mine owes Mulitaka people something, or if the mine has paid them off, and it is Ipatas and Marape who have eaten compensation money which was supposed to be for Mulitaka. I don’t see a strong consensus about whether it was wrong to sabotage the mine or not.

On 15 October posts appeared on Facebook showing the Tauipaka bridge restored. One has a video of “Jerry Yaka a chief principal owner” where Yaka says he restored the bridge and his group had nothing to do with the people who attacked the convoy.

I’ve heard two references now to a private company flying from Tari to Kairik and then on to Hagen — on Facebook someone even listed prices (around K350 iirc). I’ve also seen a post claiming that NPL has no claim on Kairik airstrip. So it may be that something is happening there. If you know anything about this, feel free to contact me on Facebook or via email.

In other news, PNG has a new Mining Minister, Wake Goi from Jimi electorate.

There has also been progress (perhaps?) on the CDA, or Community Development Agreement. MRA announced that it has been “initialed”. It was initialed by SML landowner representatives (except two of them), representatives from Porgera Urban and Rural LLGs, and GoPNG (the national government of Papua New Guinea). NPL (‘the mine’) and EPG (Enga Provincial government) have not initialed it yet. “Initialed” apparently means that the initialers find it acceptable, and it will then be run past civil servants to ensure it is all legal and makes sense financially. Then it will be endorsed by the NEC (‘cabinet’). It’s not clear to me if NPL and EPG must sign this agreement, and why this is a step forward if they must but didn’t. It’s always hard to understand what is happening inside a negotiation when you are watching from the outside.

This is a weekly update about events in Porgera. Before we get started a few caveats: I’m not in Porgera and I’m only relying on my own knowledge of the valley and open sources. I am not a lawyer. I do my best to keep the dates straight but they may get a day off due to my being in a different time zone than Porgera. With that out of the way, let’s talk about what has happened since around roughly the 22nd of September:

Porgera itself appears to be relatively quiet. On the 27th the group Porgera SOE Operations 2024 was added to Facebook and really looks like it was actually set up by the SOE staff. The group is public and anyone with a Facebook account can view it, so I will describe its content fully and quote from it.

Around this same time, there was apparently an official launch ceremony held in Porgera to inaugurate the SOE. It was featured in articles by Simiky Yandapake, Phoebe Gwangilo and Miriam Zarriga. The articles cover Ipatas’s speech, who said the SOE would last two months. “We must make use of the… limited time and assisted them [SOE staff[ wherever we can in terms of investigation, prosecution and imprisonment because these are the same people who are continuously disturbing the peace in the valley and they need to be put behind bars”. Joseph Tondop also announced an emergency number (7492 1661) which people can call if there is trouble. The number was repeatedly shared around on Facebook.

It is very hard for me to understand, but apparently there are issues around Yonge, in Laiagam, where Sakar is based. Miriam Zarriga reports on “five held hostage in Lagaip” after they attempted to go through the area in an ambulance (rumors have it that police, ambulance, and other vehicles can be convinced to take people out of the valley, and this is how some people with money attempt to leave). There have been Facebook posts which seem to suggest Porgerans might be targeted if they try to leave the valley (in retaliation for the SOE being brought in the kick non-Porgerans out). Other posts which suggest Porgerans can travel freely, but warring Engan clans will not be allowed to pass. I am too far away to really understand what is going on.

On the 27th the Post published a long and detailed story by Simiky Yandapake entitled “First step taken to restore peace in Porgera” that detailed Tondop (the Acting Assistant Commissioner of Police) to visit “the parties involved in the brutal tribal clash” which are now listed as “Pianda, Sakar, and Aiyala”. Jospeh Minape (described as the Porgera Lw and Order Coordinator) was there as well. In this article and several posts on Facebook, Tondop and others express themselves very professionally and irenically. In contrast, I feel the coverage in the Post and the National has focused on, shall we say, the punitive power of the police. The article describes three institutions at work in Porgera: the Law and Order Coordinator, Operation Mekim Save (OMS) and the SOE staff.

Posts from around the 27th made on the SOE Facebook group describes discussions at Mungalep (Piande), Suyan (Aiyala), and then Laiagam. On the 28th SOE staff and Law and Justice Coordinator Nelson Lea were at Yonge meeting with “The Sakar Clan leader Cr Morbe” and other leaders who “expressed their willingness to collaborate with Cr Towa of Piande”.

In other news:

On the 24th, the Post printed an op-ed entitled “Benefit sharing the real issue in Porgera“. The piece argues “resource developers and the state must come up with a strategy that enables everyone in the district to gain one way or another from resource development” instead of “only the impacted community benefit [sic] and not everyone”. In this way, benefit sharing would be about “providing a sustainable livelihood for everyone in the wider project area”. The piece was widely shared on Facebook — or at least the sectors of it that I was on.

Over at Business Advantage PNG, Nadav Shlezinger interviewed Barrick CEO Mark Bristow (this is the CEO of the transnational corporation, not just of Barrick Niugini Limited). Bristow’s vision of the Porgera Mine envisages production 500,000 ounces of gold a year “if we can get all this [the mine’s operations] ]sorted out efficiently”. In terms of law and order issues, Bristow said Porgera “has 51 51 per cent Papua New Guinean ownership – government, landowners and Kumul – and they need to fulfill their side of the bargain. That is their responsibility… Security must be the top priority. Porgera is a fragmented community prone to tribal fights and disputes. Law and order and illegal mining are a constant challenge. Right now, there’s no magistrate, there’s no community policing infrastructure.” He emphasized that contracts with local people would not be given to people who “leave the valley… and don’t actually put anything back into the community” because some of “the value of the orebody… should go to building economic capacity for when the mine is already there”.

This is a weekly update about events in Porgera. Before we get started a few caveats: I’m not in Porgera and I’m only relying on my own knowledge of the valley and open sources. I am not a lawyer. I do my best to keep the dates straight but they may get a day off due to my being in a different time zone than Porgera. With that out of the way, let’s talk about what has happened since around roughly the 16th:

On the 14th the Post-Courier published a rather breathless piece entitled “People of Porgera Pleading for Their Lives”. It’s unsigned and claims that on 14 September at 5pm “warlords entered the government town in Porgera where public servants residents [sic] and burnt several houses and opened fire at the public”. Accompanying the article is a short video which they claim is taken “inside Suyan” where the narrator says that people displaced by the fighting have been sleeping outside for a week. Videos and pictures on Facebook (and in the Zarriga article mentioned below) show buildings on fire at the government station, as well as roughly 100 men marching (armed mostly with machetes) through what looks like the government station. The fighting here is described as taking place between “Sakare” (or Sakar, since Engans often don’t pronounce word-final vowels) and Tawa or Pianda Tawa.

Another video shows a man making a speech (telling his enemies to eat their mothers’ vagina, which is the worst thing you can say to someone in Porgera) surrounded by an entourage of fighters. They are equipped with a FAMAS assault rifle, shotguns, an SLR, M16s, and an SP5. I know little about these weapons, but I’m rapidly learning to identify pictures of them. These are serious firearms. I don’t think everyone involved has this much firepower, but it is a telling indication of how serious fighting is. To me (and probably you), the word ‘warlord’ means a leader who controls a territory through purely military rule. In Porgera it seems to mean a skilled, professional fighter — a difference in meaning to be aware of.

The next day the Post published a much stronger piece by Miriam Zarriga claiming that 20 people had been killed, including 2 NPL (New Porgera Limited — “the mine”) employees. According to her 5,000 people had fled the valley. Zarriga also pointed to the broader context of fighting: Maso Karipe, Porgera’s MP, passed away, leaving a gap in leadership in the valley. The 24 May landslide in Mulitaka has basically made it impossible to enter the valley. Porgera has a large population which relies on store-bought food, and the high prices created by the road closure make it difficult to get food (I’ve been told this repeatedly). It’s easy to see how Porgera had become a pressurized container ready to burst. Zarriga claims the bank is closed (I’ve confirmed this) and all government services, including the hospital at Paiam, are also closed. She described the combatants as being “two factions of illegal miners” who “fought among themselves and one face of the group killed two men from the other faction and the fight erupted from then”

On the 16th Porgera made the cover of the Post-Courier, which ran the headline “Porgera in Flames“. I think this is the 3rd time in my career that I can remember seeing this headline on the Post, sadly.

The national reported that Police Commissioner David Manning declared emergency order for Porgera. he is quoted as saying “We have 122 security personnel on the ground, including mobile squads, dog squads and Sector Response Unit as well as personnel from Papua New Guinea Defence Force”. Samson Kua, Manning’s deputy commissioner, would be deployed on the ground alongside Assistant Commissioner Joseph Tondop. I don’t know these people but Tondop had a good reputation among the people I spoke to in POM when I was there over the (boreal) summer. The additional troops to be deployed would be on top of these 122, apparently.

EmTV and others have reported that Peter Ipatas, the governor of Enga, supports an SOE for Porgera.

On the 17th the mine issued a press release confirming that two of its employees had been killed and that it would suspend operations until the 19th.

By the 18th the move to implement a SOE was advanced enough that it made the cover of the Post . The subhead claims “police will use lethal force to disarm anyone with weapons”. EmTV covered Marape’s announcement of a deployment. The National reported a “temporary by-pass for light emergency vehicles” was opened at the Mulitaka landslip. It also announced that the SOE curfew was in effect and additional police would be added to the 100 or so PNGDF “contingent already stationed in Enga”. The mine’s “asset protection unit” (securtity) was “working with state security personnel” they also reported. Overall, the national claimed that there were 2,000 local hires of the mine in the valley.

One of the best and most thoughtful sources of news about Porgera has been Benar News, which ran an intelligent piece of analysis from Michael Kabuni about the fighting in Porgera and PNG more generally. Another piece by Harlyne Joku and Stefan Armbuster provides good background reading on the mine. Joku had another piece on tribal fighting which, like Kabuni’s, focuses on the phenomenon more generally.

Another article on the 19th from Miriam Zarriga provided some details on the movement of PNG forces: Highland Mobile Square 6 was stationed in Porgera, left on the 12th, and was scheduled to return (as of the article’s posting) with Squads 7 and 8 to bring the total number of PNG forces in the valley up to 250. She estimated that the fighting had killed 30 and injured 50. According to her, Mobile Square 7 arrived in Porgera on Tuesday (the 17th, I believe).

On the 21st, Minister for Police Peter Tsiamalili Jr. confirmed that a two month National Emergency had been declared in Enga. The Minister described the fighters as “illegal squatters”. He said the National Emergency would include roadblocks where people would be searched for weapons (I have been through these in a past SOE), “improved capacity at the Mukurumanda Correctional Services facility” (a newer jail near Wabag) and Porgera police station (at Paiam, I believe), and more court services. These are important steps because often even if there are more police in Porgera, the rest of the criminal justice system does not have capacity to deal with people the police arrest.

While Porgera continues to struggle with violence, the issue of tribal fighting is working its way in to wider debates in the country about mining. The post and the National both reported on critical remarks made by Dr. Lino Tom, MP for Wabag, who argued that “rushing to open the mine before addressing Landowner Benefit Framework [sic] will inevitably lead to more problems”. When the mine reopened this year, not all of the agreements had been signed which were necessary for it to begin operation.

Specifically, the Community Development Agreement had not been finalized. This is the agreement signed by landowners which specifies what benefits they will receive from the mine (other than the equity they hold). Instead, they signed a “consent compensation agreement” to allow the mine to open while negotiations continued. Most landowner representatives are in POM at the moment negotiating this agreement. ‘Relocation’ is one of the key ‘legacy issues’ of Porgera, and a key part of this agreement might be that Porgeran landowners would be relocated outside of Porgera. Tom is suggesting that until this agreement is signed there will be an “escalation of lawlessness in this valley and more lives lost”.

On the 19th Jerry Garry pushed back on these claims. He is the managing director of the MRA (tldr: the government authority that deals with mining). Accoridng to Garry, “the fighting started between two illegal miners from Kandep and Laiagam districts respectively, over gold that they had mined illegally in the pit” and had little to do with the issue of benefits for Porgera landowners. The operation of the mine and negotiations were “processes that can run in parallel”.

On the 20th TVWan reported that in CDA negotiations, 700 million had been committed by the government to resettle Porgera landowners. It is always hard to understand what is going on in negotiations, but it may be that the exchange between Tom and Garry happened in public in order to have something happen in private in negotiations. The negotiations are still ongoing.

That’s all for this week. I’ll be back next week.

For years I’ve been keeping bookmarks and links to news about Porgera for my own scholarly record. Because there is another surge in fighting again I thought it would be useful to write a short post summarizing what appears to be happening in the valley. I am in the US, and get most of my news from social media and chatting with friends online, so I am not a good source of accurate information. But hopefully I can collate some things to put together a fuller picture.

I first noticed this latest round of violence in Porgera on 10 September (all dates in US time) when social media posts started showing pictures of smoke rising above Suyan. Suyan is an area east of the government station which is home to a large fenced off campus with accommodations for mine workers called Suyan “Camp”. It was not clear if Suyan Camp or the Suyan area was on fire — if it was the camp then that would be very unusual. To the best of my knowledge (and to my surprise) most mining facilities appear to have been untouched during the years the mine was closed. I assume this was because people wanted the mine (and the revenue it brings) to return. They also didn’t want to risk angering the police and the mine as well. So if mine facilities are destroyed in this conflict, that would be a real mark of escalation.

On 11 Sep the UN Disaster Management team posted a report on fighting in Porgera (I read it on the 13th when it was posted to ASAONet). It was not much more detailed than social media postings and claimed there was fighting at Panandaka or ‘Panataka’ as they spelled it. The UN has a lot of room to improve their reports — I hope they will rise to the occasion. They claim “at least six” people died, and that “most sources report a total of ten fatalities”. It was good to have those figures.

On 13 September the Post-Courier, one of PNG’s two two newspapers, ran an article about fighting in Porgera “Porgera in state of Chaos”. To be honest, I was a bit disappointed by their coverage as well, which was not spell-checked and did not attribute any of their sources. They claimed 20 people were dead in Porgera (a number circulating on FaceBook) but did not attribute it this number to any news source. According to them seven bodies have “been identified and confirmed dead”. There is a lot of room for the Post to improve its reporting as well. Even just verifying posts on socials would be great.

On September 14th social media posts showed Upper Maipangi, above Porgera Station, on fire. There are also pictures circulating of dead bodies. I have no way to verify these, especially the dead bodies. These posts are very hard to look at. But the pictures of upper Porgera station burning do appear to be upper Porgera station.

In my discussions with people, one person described the situation as “civil war”. It appears that people from clans based in Laiagam (and perhaps Kandep) are fighting local Porgerans. There has long been tension between people born and raised in Porgera and migrants from Laiagam and Kandep (areas just east of Porgera). There is a complicated story to tell here about affinal politics and in-migration, but the tldr is that long-standing tensions appears to have broken out into fighting. Sakare is the clan whose name I’ve seen listed most often as the ‘outside’ clan fighting in Porgera. But I have no way to confirm that and I don’t know much about this group.

I’ve also seen images circulating on Social Media of a letter which appears to be from James McTiernan, the general manager of NPL written on 15 Sep. It states that the mine would suspend operations for the 16th, 17th, and 18th of September. It gives workers three days of leave without pay to sort themselves out. If workers stay on site they will be paid during this period. The document looks pretty legit to me.

There is also a document circulating dated 16 Sep entitled “EMERGENCY ORDERS FOR PORGERA” and signed by Samson Kua announcing a curfew in Porgera that will run from 5pm to 7am every day. It says that vehicles will be searched and weapons will be confiscated. It looks like a real document to me as well.

There is a very good article on this new SoE by Harry Pearl and Harlyne Joku at Benar News entitled “PNG authorizes lethal force to quell deadly violence near Porgera mine: Police declared a state of emergency after fighting between illegal miners and local landowners”. Joku’s reporting is consistently good.

NPL hasn’t posted any press releases about this on their website yet. A lot of media sites (like the Post and EmTV) have been focused on independence day celebrations. We’ll see if they turn to Porgera now that independence weekend is over. It is a depressing way to spend independence weekend. This violence in Porgera is terrible.