The Autonomous Bougainville Government has launched Bougainville Wings Limited, describing it as Bougainville’s flag carrier and a milestone for the region’s aviation sector.
President Ishmael Toroama officially launched the airline at Buka Airport yesterday.
Bougainville Wings is a joint venture between the ABG and Outback Aviation. The ABG holds a 70 per cent majority share through the Bougainville Public Investment Corporation Limited, while industry partners hold the remaining 30 per cent.
“The aviation industry in Bougainville has long awaited progress and we are looking forward to expand this significant beginning,” President Toroama said in his address.
President of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, Ishmael Toroama, standing beside the aircraft, Bougainville wings. (PHOTO/ABG Media)
He said his government was committed to ensuring the national carrier’s success.
“Under my leadership and the department of Commerce, Trade, Industry and Economic Development, we are committed to making sure that Bougainville Wings is well established and managed to bring revenue to the ABG government, as it is intended.”
The launch was attended by members of the ABG, Commerce, Trade, Industry and Economic Development Minister Hon. Robin Wilson, Bougainville Wings Limited Chairman Mr. Sylvester Kenatsi, the Secretary for the Department of Economic Development, and other invited guests.
Minister Wilson said the airline had moved from planning to operations after securing regulatory approval.
“We are no longer planning, we are operating. Bougainville Wings successfully secured its certificate of Airworthiness from CASA PNG on the 20th of December 2025,” he said.
Bougainville Wings is expected to play a key role in supporting the Bougainville 2052 Vision by improving connectivity across the region, particularly for remote and underserved communities such as Nissan, Buin, Torokina, and the Atolls.
The ABG said the launch marks a “humble yet significant beginning” for Bougainville’s aviation industry, with a focus on sustainability, growth, and expansion.
Traditional landowners from Bougainville staged a protest on Friday against plans by the region’s autonomous government to let an Indian company reopen the long-shuttered Panguna gold and copper mine.
At least several dozen staged a protest near the mine site in central Bougainville against Autonomous Region of Bougainville (AROB) President Ishmael Toroama’s plans to allow India-based Lloyds Metals and Energy Limited (LMEL) restart the mine, which was shut down by a local uprising over 35 years ago.
Female landowners from the villages of Guava and Moroni led the protest, which involved the ceremonial placement of a plant in the ground.
“To the Lloyds company and BCL (Bougainville Copper Limited) and others, we are planting this as a cultural symbol: we don’t want the Panguna Mine to reopen. This is a cultural ritual to put a stop to the reopening of the mine,” Chieftess Genevieve Ampa’oi said.
Picture supplied by Panguna Osikaiang
The protest comes amid opposition from prominent Bougainvillean community leaders including Domana Ward member and former rebel commander Moses Pipiro. Critics say Toroama has not properly consulted with the local land and resource owners of the Panguna mine site.
Community members have also raised concerns about what they say is the engagement of veterans from other areas of central Bougainville as security for LMEL, which they fear could lead to conflict.
Toroama’s office declined to comment when contacted by Inside PNG.
Experts estimate that tens of billions of dollars of mineral wealth remains in the mine site, but plans to reopen the mine over the years have been stymied by community opposition and deliberations over cleanups and compensation related to environmental damage from the mine’s previous operations.
Thousands of Papua New Guineans have signed up to an international multi-level marketing scheme that is being pursued in court in the United States for allegedly defrauding hundreds of thousands of people of over 400 million kina.
As many as 13,000 Papua New Guineans have signed up to the scheme, known as Onpassive.
The Orlando, Florida-based business promises individuals hefty returns from a one-time investment of $US 97 (about 375 kina) and monthly subscription fees. The company claims that investors will share in the profits from the sale of an array of software products that it has developed, and which will be released in the near future.
However, the products have failed to materialize. The U.S. financial regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), last August filed a civil complaint alleging that the business and its owner, Ashraf Mufareh, have since 2018 perpetrated an “illegal pyramid scheme.”
Onpassive owner, Ashraf Mufareh.
Pyramid schemes are a classic form of fraud in which participants are made to pay money up front, and then urged to earn their money back by recruiting new people into the fraud. The small number of people at the “top” of the pyramid can make large amounts of money, while the far greater number of people at the “bottom” lose out.
In Papua New Guinea, the scheme is being led by David Bakau, a former employee of Lloyd’s Bank in Arawa, Bougainville, who became a senior member in the late 1990s and early 2000s of the U-Vistract fraud run by Noah Musingku.
The U-Vistract scam took money from thousands of victims across PNG, Australia, and the Pacific while promising stratospheric returns that never came through. Musingku is still wanted for arrest by PNG authorities, and is currently holed up with loyalists in his home village in Siwai district, Bougainville, where he has declared himself king.
In an interview with Inside PNG, Bakau said he had long ago walked away from Musingku’s scam. But he said that, despite allegations by U.S. authorities, Onpassive was a legitimate company.
“I have no questions about it, because the legal team are handling that,” Bakau said
Onpassive Dubai.
“We believe in [Onpassive owner Mufareh’s] integrity,” he added. “I followed him in 2019 when the company was barely nothing, and they’ve basically built and I’ve seen everything developed from there.”
Bakau told Inside PNG that he had not yet made any money from Onpassive, but stands to make a 25 percent commission on each 375 kina sign-up fee paid by the scheme’s PNG investors when Onpassive’s software finally launches. He said an issue with data migration has temporarily delayed the release of the software products, which are touted as being part of an integrated artificial intelligence ecosystem that will replace platforms like Google, Zoom, and Facebook.
However, disgruntled former scheme members say such delays are simply part of the alleged scam.
U.S. regulators have alleged that Mufareh and his wife have instead used the money on personal expenses including online retail purchases, upscale dining, TV subscriptions, groceries, salon and spa visits, and the purchasing of stocks.
Bakau said he is unphased. “In every business, there’s a risk,” Bakau said. “Nobody owes anybody. So Ash [Mufareh] doesn’t owe us, we don’t owe him anything”, he said.
Onpassive and Ash Mufareh did not respond to questions.
YouTube videos and social media postings show that Onpassive’s network has targeted PNG since 2019, just a year after the inception of the alleged scam. A closed Facebook group run by senior scheme participants, named “Onpassive Nation -— Papua New Guinea”, has 5,400 members.
Reporters from Inside PNG contacted 10 to 15 Papua New Guineans who have participated in the scheme or have been drawn in by others, but all refused to speak on the record or simply did not respond.
According to the U.S. SEC’s 2023 complaint, as of March last year, Onpassive had received over $US108 million from 800,000 investors around the world.
The Panguna mine made a fortune but left war and pollution in its wake. A new lawsuit backed by anonymous investors is now seeking billions in compensation – and raising concerns about who stands to benefit.
By Aubrey Belford (OCCRP)
High in the forested mountains of Papua New Guinea’s Bougainville Island lies an abandoned, kilometer-wide crater cut deep into the earth.
Formerly one of the world’s largest gold and copper mines, the open pit now serves as an unsightly monument to the environmental and social chaos that underground riches can create.
Run for years by a subsidiary of Anglo-Australian giant Rio Tinto, the Panguna mine earned millions for Papua New Guinea (PNG) and helped bankroll its newfound independence. But it also poured waste into local waterways and fuelled anger among locals who felt robbed of the profits. When an armed uprising ultimately shuttered the mine in 1989, the impoverished island was left reeling.
Nearly three decades later, in late 2022, human rights activists, the local government, and the mine’s former operators joined forces to produce a definitive assessment of the mine’s toxic legacy. Their report, due to be released later this month, will become the basis for negotiations aimed at getting the mining companies to finally clean up the mess and compensate affected communities.
But its supporters now worry their efforts will be undermined by a class-action lawsuit launched in May against the mine’s erstwhile operators. The legal effort is being championed by former rebel leaders — and backed by anonymous offshore investors who stand to make hundreds of millions of dollars if it succeeds.
The lawsuit is part of a worldwide boom in litigation financing that seeks to take multinational companies to task for ecological or social damage while potentially reaping a fortune for lawyers and funders.
Critics in Bougainville worry the lawsuit will reopen old wounds at a time when the island is making a push to break free of Papua New Guinea and become the world’s newest sovereign nation. Many Bougainvilleans are hoping to reopen the mine, using its wealth to fund their own independence this time around.
The region’s government and many local leaders believe the class action could put the mine’s revival at risk. There are also concerns the lawsuit would leave many Bougainvilleans empty handed, while the anonymous foreign investors would walk away with a significant share of the payout.
Unlike the official assessment, which seeks to identify everyone who needs to be compensated, the class action will only share its winnings — which could potentially be in the billions of dollars — with the locals who have signed on. Others will get nothing.
“There’s already fragmentation in the community and families are already divided,” said Theonila Roka Matbob, who represents the area around Panguna in the island’s parliament and has helped lead the government-backed assessment process as a minister in the Autonomous Bougainville government.
She speaks from personal experience. The chief litigant in the class-action lawsuit, Martin Miriori, is her uncle. The two are no longer on speaking terms.
A Losing Deal
Gouged from Bougainville’s lush volcanic heart, the Panguna mine in its heyday supplied as much as 45 percent of PNG’s export revenue, providing it with the financial means to achieve independence from Australia in 1975.
The windfall, however, didn’t extend to Bougainvilleans themselves. Ethnically and culturally distinct from the rest of PNG’s population, they saw Panguna as a symbol of external domination. The mine delivered only a miserly 2-percent share of its profits to their island — along with years of environmental havoc.
Locals walk by buildings left abandoned by a subsidiary of Rio Tinto at the Panguna mine site. [[PHOTO: Aubrey Belford/OCCRP]]
During the 17 years of Panguna’s operation — from 1972 to 1989 — over a billion metric tons of toxic mine waste and electric blue copper runoff flooded rivers that flowed downstream towards communities of subsistence farmers. The result was poisoned drinking water, infertile land, and children who were drowned or injured trying to cross engorged waterways.
In 1989, enraged Bougainville locals launched an armed rebellion against the PNG government. The mine was shut down, closing off a vital source of revenue for the national government in Port Moresby. A brutal civil war raged on for nearly a decade, leaving more than 15,000 people dead, while a naval blockade by PNG’s military obliterated the island’s economy.
A peace deal in 2000 granted Bougainville substantial autonomy. But nearly a quarter-century later, the legacy of Panguna and the war it provoked is still deeply felt.
There are few paved roads and bridges in the island’s interior. Residents earn a modest living through cocoa and coconut farming, or by unregulated artisanal mining in and around the abandoned Panguna crater. Rivers polluted by years of runoff are still an otherworldly shade of milky blue.
At least 300,000 people are estimated to live on Bougainville, including as many as 15,000 who live downstream of the mine. Of those, some 4,500 have joined Miriori — Roka’s estranged uncle and a tribal leader whose brother, Joseph Kabui, served as the first president of autonomous Bougainville — in seeking restitution through the class-action suit.
“We’ve got to make people happy,” Miriori said. “They’ve lost their land forever, environment forever. Their hunting grounds. Their spiritual, sacred grounds.”
Martin Miriori, the primary litigant in the class action lawsuit. [[PHOTO: Aubrey Belford/OCCRP]]
‘Alert to Opportunities’
Miriori took many by surprise when he became the public face of the suit filed in PNG’s National Court in May against Rio Tinto and its former local subsidiary, Bougainville Copper Limited.
While the tribal leader and former rebel is a well-known figure in Bougainville, the funders of the lawsuit are not. They have managed to keep their identities secret in part because the company behind the suit, Panguna Mine Action LLC, is registered on Nevis, a small Caribbean island that does not require companies to publicly disclose their shareholders and directors.
Miriori declined to comment on who was behind the company, saying, “I will not tell you where the funding is based … you can source that from our people down there [in Australia].”
James Sing, an Australian based in New York, is Panguna Mine Action’s chief public representative. He initially agreed to an interview, but later referred reporters back to a London-based public relations agency, Sans Frontières Associates. The agency declined to reveal Panguna Mine Action’s investors.
Litigation funding documents obtained by OCCRP, however, shed some light on the history of the case. The documents show that Panguna Mine Action began to investigate the possibility of a class-action suit as early as July 2021. The Bougainvillean claimants, led by Miriori, were formally brought into an agreement with the company and its Australian and PNG lawyers in November 2022. The suit was publicly announced this May.
The lawsuit’s investors stand to profit handsomely from any eventual settlement: Panguna Mine Action is poised to receive a cut of 20 to 40 percent of any payout resulting from the suit, with the percentage increasing the longer the process takes, the funding documents show. In interviews and statements, both Miriori and Panguna Mine Action have put the potential value of any award in the billions of dollars.
The lawsuit’s financiers defend their substantial share of the potential benefits as standard practice. “The costs of launching and running the class action against a global miner are significant, and almost certainly could not be met from within Bougainville without funding from an external party,” the company said in its statement. Panguna Mine Action added it would bear sole responsibility for costs if the lawsuit is unsuccessful.
According to Michael Russell, a Sydney-based class action defense lawyer, such funding arrangements are typical in the burgeoning world of litigation finance, where investors seek out cases that promote virtuous social causes while offering huge potential payoffs.
A similar case is unfolding in Latin America, where more than 720,000 Brazilians are seeking $46.5 billion as part of a gargantuan class action against mining giant BHP and its local subsidiary for their role in a 2015 dam collapse.
In such cases, funders can justify walking away with significant cuts of any winnings because of the substantial risk they face of losing their investment if a case fails, Russell said.
Such cases are rarely initiated at the grassroots level by the victims themselves, he added.
“Most of the time, either the plaintiff firms or the funders will be the catalyst for a claim,” he said. “They are very alert to opportunities.”
Rival Restitution Plans
Government officials including Miriori’s niece, Roka, say the class-action case, which is due to hold opening arguments in October, threatens to derail the ongoing impact assessment aimed at calculating the full cost of the mine’s environmental impact and developing recommendations for addressing the damage.
The assessment, which counts community members among its stakeholders and bills itself as an independent review, is supported by Australia’s Human Rights Law Centre, who has hailed the project as “an important step” towards rectifying the mine’s devastating impact on thousands of Bougainvilleans.
However, while Rio Tinto and Bougainville Copper are both funding the project, they have not yet committed to paying for any compensation or cleanup. Roka said she was concerned the lawsuit could reduce the company’s willingness to engage with the process, since it could view the assessment as a tool that could be used against them in the courtroom.
The island’s president, Ishmael Toroama, backs the impact assessment and has lambasted the class action suit as the work of “faceless investors… taking advantage of vulnerable groups.” (His office did not respond to an interview request.)
He also expressed concern that the court proceedings threaten to “disrupt” his government’s efforts to reopen the mine, which still holds an estimated $60 billion in untapped deposits. Bougainville’s leaders see the mine as key to securing the island’s economic future as it sets out to form an independent state – a dream that drew overwhelming public support in a 2019 referendum.
Earlier this year Toroama’s government granted Bougainville Copper a five-year exploration license for the Panguna site.
The lack of media and polling in Bougainville make it hard to measure public opinion on plans to reactivate the mine, but many locals appear to support reopening it under local control as an essential tool for achieving independence.
Bougainville Copper’s brand is still toxically associated with Rio Tinto and its past abuses, despite the fact that the international mining giant gave away its majority stake for no money in 2016. The publicly traded company is now majority co-owned by the governments of PNG and Bougainville, and Port Moresby has pledged to hand over all its shares to the autonomous region in the near future.
Panguna Mine Action acknowledges that its effort effort could stand in the way of the mine’s reopening — but the company says that’s a good thing.
“It is our understanding that the people of Bougainville do not wish mining to be recommenced under any circumstances or, alternatively, unless Rio Tinto and Bougainville Copper acknowledge the past, pay compensation and remediate the rivers and surrounding valley,” the company said in a statement.
Rio Tinto declined to comment. Mel Togolo, the chairman of Bougainville Copper, told OCCRP that the lawsuit was the work of “a foreign funder who no doubt is seeking a return on an investment.”
View of the tailings located downstream of the Panguna mine.[[PHOTO: Aubrey Belford/OCCRP]]
‘Only Those Who Have Signed Will Benefit’
The fight over Panguna adds even more uncertainty to long-running anxiety over Bougainville’s future.
With global copper prices soaring on high demand for renewable energy and electric vehicles, the Panguna mine would be an attractive prize for both Western mining companies and firms from China, which is dramatically expanding its influence in the South Pacific.
Since a future Bougainvillean state would be economically dependent on the mine’s revenue, some have raised concerns that control of the mine could become a proxy battle for geopolitical influence in the broader region.
For his part, Miriori expressed little concern that a multibillion-dollar payout might stir resentment by reaching only a fraction of the people affected by the mine’s environmental destruction.
“Only those who signed will benefit,” he said, adding that the opportunity was made “very clear to people” through awareness campaigns.
“Those who have not signed, it’s their freedom of choice.”
An aerial view of the abandoned Panguna mine pit.[[PHOTO: Aubrey Belford/OCCRP]]
Among those who didn’t sign is Wendy Bowara, 48, who lives in Dapera, a bleak settlement built on a hill of mine waste. Bowara said she is looking to the government-backed assessment, not the lawsuit, to deliver compensation and clean up Panguna’s toxic legacy.
“We are living on top of chemicals,” she said. “Copper concentration is high. I don’t know if the food is good to eat or if it’s healthy to drink the water.”
But while it may seem odd given her grim surroundings, Borawa says she strongly supports reopening the mine.
“It funded the independence of Papua New Guinea,” Bowara said. “Why can’t we use it to fund our own independence?”
Panguna Mine issues took center stage at the recent CANCONEX Resource week hosted by the Papua New Guinea Camber of Resources and Energy (PNG CORE).
Despite being closed for more than 30 years the mine is in the stages to re-open but legacy issues that have been left by Bougainville Copper Limited’s operations until its closure need to be addressed.
The President and his cabinet of the Bougainville Executive council granted an extension of the exploration license, EL_01 to Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) on the 28th of January, 2024.
President of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, Ishmael Toroama speaking during CANCONEX. [[Photo: PNG Media]]
The Panguna Project is already licensed under an Exploration License for a term of five years.
What the Land owners and the people directly affected by the mine want, is to get some closure to the legacy issues, which include the environmental destruction caused by the mine.
Present at CANCONEX was President of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, Ishmael Toroama, who gave an overall report on the legacy issues of the mine including the way forward to reopening Panguna.
Theonila Roka Matbob, member for the Ioro Constituency in Central Bougainville, is a Panguna mine landowner and she is very vocal about the legacy issues left by the mine.
Old Trucks at the Panguna Mine.
She is the Minister for Community Government and also a long time activist on Panguna issues, she said during CANCONEX that they want to close the old chapter of Panguna as they move on to the new chapter.
She mentioned that there is a report; the PANGUNA MINE LEGACY IMPACT ASSESSMENT, which is set to be complete by August.
The report will help the People of Panguna understand the extent of the mine legacy issues.
The Panguna issue remains sensitive but parties in the efforts to re-open the mine are working closely together.
Panguna Mine. [[Photo//Llane Munau]]
Bougainville Copper Limited Chairman, Sir Mel Togolo was also part of the discussions at CANCONEX, he said BCL had a more community oriented approach and there is widespread acceptance for the mine’s reopening in the Panguna Area.
President Toroama who is also Minister for Minerals & Energy says all the discussions and dialogue between the Land Owners and the ABG, carefully considered support for local content and Resource Owners, he said this was paramount because it is the Land owners that own the Resource.
Theonila Roka stressed that what is important is a plan to see a more viable future for resource owners considering their attachment to the land and its resources, and they can be more sustainable after the project ends.
Insurance services in the Autonomous Bougainville Region has been restored after more than 30 years through a partnership between the Bougainville Government and Capital Insurance Group.
The re-establishment of this vital services now provides a safeguard mechanism for the establishment of new businesses and expansion of existing ones.
Paved through the Toroama-Nisira Government Bougainville’s vice President and Minister for Commerce, Patrick Nisira said the initiative is desired to restore investor confidence on the island region following the Bougainville conflict.
“Insurance services is a crucial elements of our economic independence journey that we are embarking towards achieving prosperity and self-determination,” Nisira said.
Capital Insurance Group, Chief Executive Officer, Jeremy Norton said bringing back an insurance service to Bougainville was their response to the business community that encountered business losses due to natural disasters and human-made causes.
Capital Insurance Group, Chief Executive Officer, Jeremy Norton, addressing the public in Buka town.
“This is an important part of our long-term commitment and will drive sustainability and provide the foundation for a gradual roll out of services across Bougainville,” Norton said.
The new branch will be housed in the same location in the existing TISA office in Buka. The services offered include insurance solutions such as business protection, workers’ compensation, motor and general liability to individuals and businesses.
“An important function of a good insurance company is to provide its clients with risk management advise and recommendations. This has an important role in minimizing and preventing accidents, fires, break ins, vehicle crashes and workplace accidents,” Norton said.
ABG Secretary for Department of Commerce, Trade, Industry and Economic Development, Alex Kerangpuna thanked Capital Insurance Group for sharing Bougainville’s aspirations for economic growth and for their commitment to establish their services in Bougainville.
“Our endeavor to bring in insurance services cannot come easily without having an established business partner in the insurance sector that takes up the challenge to invest here,” Kerangpuna said.
A new government hall built for community engagements was declared open in Ioro, Panguna District in Bougainville.
This facility is a purpose-built for community meeting spaces with kitchenettes and storage rooms, a disability access ramp, chairs and storage racks, ceiling fans, and a 9,000-litre water tank.
Delivered at a cost of K30 million, it is one of several infrastructures built by the Australian government through the 19 districts in the Autonomous Bougainville Region.
Australian High Commissioner to PNG John Feakes was in Bougainville to witness launch of Australia funded projects.
“These buildings provide meetings spaces for community governments and wards, furthering their efforts to meet their community’s development needs, ” said Feakes.
This community government infrastructure initiative supports Australia’s localisation policy, which prioritises contracting of local Bougainville-based service providers. The project created employment and skills development opportunities in the construction sector for over 200 people across Bougainville.
Minister for Community Government and District Affairs in the Autonomous Bougainville Government, Theonila Roka-Matbob, said the Community Government facilities are designed to support community governments and wards.
She added that the hall now provide a functional space for the elected women and men to work together to perform their leadership and administrative duties and for community meetings and local activities.
Residents in Arawa town should start enjoying a more reliable access to electricity supply with the completion of renewable energy upgrades come 2025.
This includes the Autonomous Region of Bougainville’s first commercial-scale solar farm with battery storage.
These upgrades are part of a broader suite of the Australian support for provincial power stations across Papua New Guninea and include plans to upgrade Buka’s power station.
To mark the project’s half-way point, Australian High Commissioner To PNG, John Feakes, was taken on a tour by Autonomous Bougainville Government President, Ishmael Toroama to the power station
Feakes said Australia is committed to improving access to energy in Bougainville and is supporting the ABG’s economic development and energy goals.
“The solar panels installed are already providing power to Arawa. Once fully completed in 2025, this project will further improve power supply for local businesses and enhance many facets of people’s lives, including health and education, and increasing safety and security, especially for women and girls,” said Feakes.
The PGK18.8 million renewable energy upgrades in Arawa are being implemented in two stages.
The first stage is a small solar plant at PNG Power Limited’s (PPL) existing power station that, as of March this year, has begun supplying power in Arawa.
The second stage will deliver a larger solar farm with a battery energy storage system at a new site that PPL acquired in 2023 with assistance from the ABG.
Once completed, the upgrades will decrease running costs for PPL by reducing reliance on expensive diesel fuel and will cut carbon emissions by 1,800 tonnes of CO2e in the first year alone, allowing PPL to supply more reliable power to the people of Arawa.
“Australia looks forward to jointly launching the completed project with the Government of PNG and the ABG in March 2025,” Feakes said.
There’s notable development made in the ongoing discussions between the Autonomous Bougainville Government and Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) in relation to the Judicial Review Dialogue.
This includes the appointment of five Bougainvillean directors to reflect it’s local representatation.
“I am pleased to advise that good progress has been made in our ongoing discussions with Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) aimed at amicably ending long-running Judicial Review proceedings in the National Court of PNG, “said Toroama.
In January 2018, the Bougainville Government refused an extension of BCL’s exploration licence (ELO1).
In April 2018, the Court granted a leave to BCL for a judicial review of the decision.
Toroama said much has happened since then, including the historic referendum that’s paving Bougainville’s path to independence.
“BCL has also continued its transition as a local company, and the ABG currently has 36.45% shareholding in BCL. Through this, the process of transferring another 36.45% presently held by the National Government started,” said Toroama.
Panguna Mine Pit
In total, the ABG and people of Bougainville are set to have a 72.9% ownership stake in BCL.
As a result, the ABG and BCL have agreed on terms for a deed of settlement that would result in BCL ending the judicial review proceedings once the parties have delivered on a series of undertakings.
These include BCL contributing funds to assist Panguna reburials and reactivating the Bougainville Copper Foundation education scholarships program.
For its part, the ABG has agreed, consistent with the Bougainville Mining Act 2015, to reconsider BCL’s EL01 extension application with a view to extending the exploration licence for five years.
“It must be stressed that this would NOT be a mining licence; the issuance of which is subject to a separate process. BCL has agreed to file a notice with the court for the discontinuance of the Judicial Review,” said Toroama.
An extension of EL01 will allow BCL to continue its program of community support and work cooperatively with the ABG, landowners and the broader community to achieve mutual goals.
An abandoned bridge near the once busy mining area of Panguna.
Any future redevelopment of Panguna under a mining licence will inevitably require the involvement of many project partners. The ABG will continue to progress dialogue with landowners and important stakeholders in preparation for the eventual granting of a mining licence in the near future.
In the meantime, required feasibility related activities must be progressed under an exploration licence; these activities will take years to complete before the project sees actual mining development stage.
“Panguna is also a Bougainville-wide agenda given its relationship with the Bougainville Crisis. This fact, coupled with evidence of strong backing across Bougainville from prior consultative forums undertaken by the ABG in North, Central and South Bougainville supports my decision to pursue this path as President,” President Toroama said.
The Autonomous Bougainville Region has voted in their first woman representative into the National Parliament.
Pangu candidate, Francesca Semoso, has been declared member elect for the North Bougainville Open seat after passing the absolute majority.
Semoso collected 14,851 votes after the 15th exclusion round passing the absolute majority of 14,164 votes.
Bougainville President Ismael Toroama was among the first leaders to congratulate Semoso. He highlighted that Semoso is not new to tthe political environment in Bougainville.
“The Hon. Francesca Semoso is a strong advocate of social issues, and progressive development. And an even stauncher advocate of Bougainville’s desire for political independence from Papua New Guinea. She will champion Bougainville’s Independence aspirations on the floor of the National Parliament to the best of her ability,” said Toroama.
The North- Bougainville Open seat was left vacant following the death of former member, William Nakin last July.
Toroama said for more than a year the people of North Bougainville were deprived of the right of representation in the National Parliament.
“I am glad that the people of North Bougainville finally have a National Member of Parliament, who will represent North Bougainville in the 11th National Parliament of Papua New Guinea,” Toroama said.
Semoso was one of the four female candidates who contested the seat. She becomes the third women elected into the 11th Parliament.
![Panguna Mine. [[Photo//Llane Munau]]](https://insidepng.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/WhatsApp-Image-2024-07-13-at-13.10.52.jpeg)
