Kayaking Watut River - Picture courtesy of gradientandwater
“If not corrected quickly, this will become a significant issue for the people who use and rely on the Watut River System for their existence.”The first thing that springs to mind when you hear of the Watut River, is white water rapids, copious amounts of rushing, fast flowing water and the wild outdoors, but this is only one face of this amazing river system that travels over 100 km, through several electoral boundaries and over terrain that is breathtaking in one instant and serene and moody in the next.
The many faces that make the Watut experience begin at Hidden Valley, in
clear mountain top creeks that are the headwaters of this mighty river, where
once fed by torrential rains it starts its extraordinary journey. There the
creek quickly builds up its volume of water, progressively draining other
creeks and tributaries and the torrent becomes an impressive river in a
heartbeat. Over its 100 or so kilometers course the Watut changes its character
many times as it moves down a geographical fall of some 8,000 feet or 2,500m
between its headwaters and the lower Watut. It slows only once it reaches the
flood plains where it meanders to join the great Markham River. The journey
continues on only another 10 or so kilometre to where the Markham finally
empties into the Huon Gulf disgorging its cumulative brackish contents of water
and silt in a plume that extends some 20km out to sea.
This remarkable river, known the world over as one of the toughest white
water courses, flows through the Bulolo and Huon Gulf electorates of the Morobe
Province. It provides for a vast number of communities along its entire length,
even at the headwaters some 8,000 feet above sea level. As the river reaches
the Watut plains it slows and broadens, winding its way to the Markham
confluence and here a myriad of aquatic marvels exist from the flora that
shrouds its banks to the fauna that in some species, exist only in this part of
the world.
It is home to the Watut and Mumeng people of Bulolo and the Babuaf of the
Huon Gulf giving sustenance to communities in the form of food, water,
recreation, transport and gold. The Watut River is an important feature to
these rural people.
But there is trouble brewing in paradise. This picture of a pristine
wilderness is under threat and the river system has been taking a beating,
literally, for the last two years by a sinister force which is both seen and
unseen and whose presence is quickly emerging under the guise of development
for the region. Unfortunately, the future of this once-awesome waterway looks
increasingly bleak. The natural beauty of the Watut River is quickly being
compromised by waste material from the construction of the Hidden Valley Gold
Mine. The mine is operated by Morobe Mining Joint Ventures which is the
operating entity for international mining partners Harmony Gold of South Africa
and Australia's Newcrest Mining Limited.
Since September 2007, the Watut River has been subjected to inordinate
quantities of waste rock and debris as run-off from the river's headwaters
where the Hidden Valley Gold Mine is situated.
To date, some 50 million tones of earth have been excavated from the top of
the mine's main pit area and vast amounts have ended up in the river as debris
from the deliberate practice of side-casting. The problem of degradation in the
Watut actually develops from an act of god, which being the extraordinarily
high rainfall patterns in this region of the world. Up to 10m in one year is
not usual and as a tropical rainforest zone, the abundance of precipitation has
become both friend and foe for this great waterway.
Early last year (2009), the telltale signs of environmental damage to the
lower Watut waterways began to emerge in places an under circumstances the
developers of Hidden Valley Gold Mine claimed would not occur. Up until that
point every communication made to communities near and beside the Watut River
professed that MMJV had the situation under control and that damage along the
course of the Watut system was minimal. It publicly stated through its
environment and community affairs officers that according to its studies of the
Watut River and models it based its Environmental Management Plan on, very
little damage would visit the Middle and Lower Watut regions and if any was to
occur, it would be of little consequence and only temporary.
Unfortunately what is now becoming clearer by the day is that these claims
could not be further from the truth. As demonstrated in the Fly River
experience, a latent but permanent by-product of mining in PNG that discharge
waste into waterways with a flood basin is a phenomenon called dieback.
The destruction caused in this phenomenon is not temporary nor is it manageable,
unless retention mechanisms are developed at the mine site itself for the fifth
side-cast in the mines pit clearing process. According to experts, if not
corrected quickly, this matter will become a significant issue for the people
who use and rely on the Watut River system for their existence.
Sedimentation and silting of the levels being observed in the lower Watut
can only be possible if there is an inundation of suspended material in the
water itself. The dynamics of laden water is that it will slow where the
gradient permits, enabling sediments to settle. To stand on solid landfill
where once there was over a meter of moving water and marshland indicates
someone has not done their homework. This clogging up of important aquatic
systems will have rolling repercussions as the habitat for aquatic fauna is
destroyed, important flora used by river communities die and navigable
waterways disappear.
According to scientists; even within MMJV, this phenomenon would migrate
along the lower Watut River unless structures to mitigate sediment inputs at Hidden
Valley are constructed. In the absence of these structures, the problem will
continue to grow.
Adding to this dilemma is the pathetic lack of action from Department of
Environment which has done little to monitor the activities of the mine.
Whether by design or from lack of resources, the stringency of the Environment
Act of 2000 is directly held to
question as clearly the department has simply allowed the developer to
self-regulate its own actions. Though unacceptable, this is unfortunately the
norm in PNG, much to the detriment of the rural communities to which the
department has a moral and ethical obligation to protect. Engineered dams
called toes designed to contain and manage run-off from Hidden Valley and
Kaveroi still have not been constructed nor have many of the systems designed to
monitor the impacts of the mine been commissioned. Yet the Department of
Environment confirms “stringent” compliance by the developer. A statement
provided by the Minister for Environment on August 14, 2009 simply corroborated
information provided by MMJV with a footnote to say the matter would be looked
at in due curse.
The provincial government too has muddied the waters further, so to speak,
with the chairman of its mining committee, Benson Suwang describing the
situation as simply "collateral damage".
The concern for communities now is MMJV's continued insistence that it has
the situation under control when clearly its experts have been wrong. Without a
commitment to include these communities within the mine impact zone, the matter
would simply be passed from one study to the next until it is forgotten just as
it has for the Western province.
The impacts of damage done and being done to the environment especially in
the Middle and Lower Watut will be felt for a Iong time and will affect
generations of communities living along the waterway. The current compensation
regime for Hidden Valley does not and will not consider the claims outside an
exclusive mine impact zone which means our concerns will be passed over.
Without the Department of Environment's intervention little will be made of
this issue and the suffering of the affected communities will simply go
unheard.
The people of Bulolo and Huon Gulf who are custodians of this remarkable
river system deserve better from MMJV, Harmony Gold and Newcrest Mining. They
deserve better from the Department of Environment and Mineral Resources
Authority (MRA) and they certainly deserve better from the Morobe Provincial
Government. By now the lessons learned from the development of other mines and
especially, from the Ok Tedi experience and Wau Bulolo Historical old Rush
should have armed the relevant agencies of State with the means to recognize
instances of breach or a shortfall in compliance and move to correct them. It
is the least that these communities should expect from government.
The Union of Watut River Communities Association Incorporated (UoWRCA Inc)
is the only party to have made a commitment not to let this matter rest and
intends to fully explore available options to the affected people and communities
to seek redress.
REUBEN METE (Mr.)
President
Union of Watut River Communities Association Incorporated
