Environmentalists condemn the government’s inaction in closing the mine

Environmental groups this Friday condemned the inaction and lack of transparency of the Panamanian government to carry out the process of closing the copper mine it manages. Minera Panamá, a subsidiary of Canada’s First Quantum Minerals (FQM)which has been disabled since November when the Court declared “unconstitutional” the contract renewing its concession.

“(The government) has done nothing, except to remain silent with short statements and posts on social networks, but without concrete actions,” the director of the ecological association told EFE. Adopt the forest, Guido Berguido.

According to the environmentalist leader of the historic anti-mining protests in November, there is “real concern” because after more than two months Supreme Court of Justice in Panama ruled that the contract with the Canadian mining company was “unconstitutional”, there was “no coercive action or transparent action” by the executive branch Laurentino Cortizo.

Nearly a dozen environmental organizations condemned today that the government “is not respecting its own plan to close the mine (and) is putting the area at serious risk and increasing the country’s vulnerability to international arbitration” that the country of Panama will have to face over the demolition of the controversial mining contract.

In that statement, the groups point out that “On March 7, $108 million in closure, post-closure and contingency coverage for the project’s environmental compliance warranty expires. However, no resolution or specific instructions have been issued or published ( …) to correct this violation or to pay the specified bond.”

They warn that the mining company is “waiting” for the new government to “renegotiate”

With a general election on May 5, the organizations warned today that the company could be “waiting” for the new Government to “renegotiate” the contract, without detailing that possible strategy.

This information gap appears to be related to a political dispute and the mining company is waiting for the new government to enter into some new negotiations that would be beyond what the citizens want, the president of the Panamanian board of the International Union told the Nature preservationlawyer Ricardo Wong.

The contract that extended the concession for 20 years, with the possibility of extending it to the mine, was canceled on November 28 by the verdict of the highest judicial body of that Central American country after almost a month of intense protests that caused a severe internal crisis.

Last December, the Panamanian government announced a strategy for the orderly and final closure of the mine, whose development will take between 6 and 18 months at a cost of 1.5 million dollars, and whose execution could take between 7 and 9 years at a cost of 800 and 1000 million dollars.

This plan considers three specific strategies: orderly and final closure; defense of the state before international arbitrations; and sustainable replacement of metal mining in gross domestic product (GDP) national.

Currently, the mining company – the largest open pit copper mine in Central America – is under a “disposal” plan with only 20% of the workforce, which had about 7,000 workers.