Residents block road to Newmont site
Wednesday, June 14 2000 - 02:15 AM WIB
Hundreds of residents in the Jereweh district in Lombok, West Nusatenggara (NTB) province blocked the road leading to the mining site of PT Newmont Nusa Tenggara in Batuhijau district on Monday as protests for being denied to work at the company, Astaga.com reported on Wednesday.
The report said that the protesting residents stopped public vehicles heading to the mining site, harassing the passengers and some even robbed the passengers of their money. The protesters also stopped trucks carrying supplies of basic needs.
Senior Manager for External Affair of the mining company Robert Humberson confirmed the incident and he said that the situation had returned to normal after the local police came to end the protests. He regretted the incident, saying that it was not just protest but "already a crime".
Humberson said that he understood that many people wanted to work with the company in order to survive with their families. "But unfortunately we could not receive all the people here as workers," he said.
He said that more than 1,000 people or about 60 percent of its workers had been recruited from several villages near the gold mining sites. "The young people, in fact, posses no skills and working experiences but the company is willing train them to enable them to work in the mining site," he said. (*)