Indonésie. Furie villageoise contre une mine d’or
Une foule de 10 000 personnes a mis le feu le 26 janvier à l’hôtel de ville de Bima, sur l’île de Sumbawa, à l’est de Bali, pour contraindre le maire à annuler le permis d’exploitation de PT Sumber Mineral Nusantara, une société qui extrait de l’or sur 24’980 hectares, écrit Kompas.
Une manifestation pour les mêmes motifs, le 24 décembre dernier, avait fait deux morts parmi les villageois et la police avait procédé à des dizaines d’arrestations. Les manifestants ont par ailleurs réussi à libérer les 53 personnes détenues précédemment en menaçant d’incendier aussi la prison. Un porte-parole de la mairie a assuré que les autorités étaient disposées à revoir leur position mais en respectant une procédure légale qui demanderait du temps.
Leur presse (CourrierInternational.com), 27 janvier 2012.
Indonesian protests force government to revoke gold mining permits
Joint Indonesian-Australian mining venture halted after string of violent protests at which two were killed.
Indonesia has revoked permits for a joint Indonesian-Australian mining venture on Sumbawa island after a string of violent protests in which two people died and a government office was set alight.
The country’s leading environmental group, however, said it doubted the government’s pledge was an « honest commitment ».
Thousands of protesters rioted on Thursday in Bima, Sumbawa – 1,330 km east of the capital, Jakarta – where they set fire to the district head’s office to demand an end to the gold exploration plan, which they said would damage their land and livelihoods.
« The preliminary information from Bima is that people were acting anarchist by burning the regent’s office … We don’t know if there are any casualties, » a police spokesman told Reuters.
Many of Sumbawa’s 1.3 million residents are fishermen and farmers worried about the environmental effects of gold mining on their land and water supplies, according to Walhi, Indonesia’s largest environmental advocacy group.
Thursday’s violence was the latest in a string of protests in Sumbawa over the past year, during which villagers and students demanded that Bima’s head district revoke the permit for the joint mining venture between Sumber Mineral Nusantara and Australian-listed Arc Exploration. In December, two protesters were shot at point-blank range by police and killed, and another eight injured, in Sape port.
The energy minister, Jero Wacik, told Reuters the mining permit would be revoked but the process would take time. The government’s decision to revoke the permit, however, may not be the boon protesters were fighting for, said Walhi’s mining campaigner Pius Ginting.
« The Indonesian government has many times made this promise in the past, saying they want to protect the environment, but then their policies still continue, » he said. « For example, they said they would stop mining in national parks, but then they changed the status of ‘national park’ to accommodate mining operations. »
« So we don’t believe their decision to revoke the permit, as we don’t believe it is an honest commitment by the government. »
Arc Exploration announced on 3 January its exploration licence had been temporarily suspended for one year since 23 December.
Thursday’s protests in Bima follow a succession of demonstrations over the last year against mining operations across Indonesia.
In October, thousands of miners in Freeport, Papua clashed with security officers after demanding pay rises from the US-run copper and gold mining firm PT Freeport Indonesia. One protester was killed and several others injured in the violence.
The Indonesian Mining Association has agreed the government should revoke permits for mining companies that threatened the livelihoods of locals, the Jakarta Post reported.
Leur presse (Kate Hodal, guardian.co.uk), 27 janvier 2012.