Villagers blockade KEM road once again
Monday, May 15 2000 - 04:00 AM WIB
The people of the Kebut village in West Kutai regency, East Kalimantan, resumed on Sunday to blockade the road to the mining site of the giant gold mining firm PT Kelian Equatorial Mining (KEM).
KEM spokesman Kasa Mulyono was quoted by the Kaltim Post daily as saying that the blockade was only made by the people of the Kebut village.
Kasan said that the blockade created jitters among the KEM employees because the move could disrupt delivery of basic supplies to the mining site.
KEM operation was shut temporarily shut down after the villagers blockaded the road to the mining site. The villagers were demanding a compensation for the land acquired by the company.
But the village protesters agreed to reopen the road on Thursday, allowing the company to resume operation on Saturday.
Kasan said that KEM would continue to renegotiate with the protesting villagers with the people of Kebut today over the land compensation.
He said that KEM was determined to pay the compensation, but the negotiation might take some time.
KEM is 90 percent owned by the giant Rio Tinto mining group.
Meanwhile, director general of mining Surna T. Djajadiningrat defended the government's stance not to intervene in the dispute between the company and the villagers.
Surna said that an intervention into the process of resolving the problem might not be accepted by both parties.
He dismissed suggestion that the Ministry of Mines and Energy was negligence of the KEM problem.
Surna also said that there's no need for the military intelligence nor the Ministry of Defense and Security to be involved in resolving the problem as proposed by the Minister of Investment and State Enterprises Development Rozy Munir.
"There's no urgency for the Ministry of Defense and Security to be involved in this problem," he said, in response to press report that Rozy was planning to invited the Ministry to help resolve the problem. (*)