The mine that sparked a civil war but could bankroll the world’s next nation

He did not even feel the first bullet. Nor the one that followed.

“But when I saw my blood flowing, I fainted,” recalls 50-year-old Leo Orinu, who lives in the village of Darutue, deep in the mountains of the Pacific island of Bougainville.

The year was 1989 and the island was in turmoil. As a then 16-year-old, Leo had joined the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA), a guerrilla group that was rebelling against the central government of Papua New Guinea. There was also hatred directed at the British-Australian mining corporation Rio Tinto, which owned the island’s Panguna mine, one of the largest copper and gold mines in the world.

“We did not want the mine to destroy our country and we hated the way the Papua New Guineans treated us,” Leo Orinu says.

On the day he was hit by gunfire and badly injured, he and his guerrilla comrades were caught in an ambush by the Papua New Guinean police in the mountains.

This was at the beginning of a conflict that in the 1990s would develop into the deadliest in the Pacific region since World War II. The Bougainville crisis is estimated to have claimed up to 15,000 lives, most of them civilians dying from disease and food shortages.

When Papua New Guinea gained its independence from Australia in 1975, the Panguna mine, which had opened three years earlier, became a cornerstone of the economy.

Production at the site accounted for as much as 45 percent of the country’s exports. It was a lucrative operation for Rio Tinto, yet the local economy in Bougainville hardly benefitted, while landowners in the mining area only received small amounts of compensation for the destruction of their local environment.

Social tensions increased when many people from other parts of Papua New Guinea moved in to work in the mining industry. Bougainville became a powder keg – which exploded at the end of 1988.

A group of militant landowners in Panguna launched a sabotage campaign against the mine, which was closed a few months later. Rio Tinto left – after having made profits of an estimated £1.6 billion over 17 years. 

The violence soon spread, and in order to save its main source of revenue, the central government in Papua New Guinea clamped down hard and violently, backed by Rio Tinto and Australia.

Bougainville soon was placed under blockade, completely isolating the region from the outside world for much of the 1990s. The blockade forced a great deal of ingenuity where vehicles were converted to run on coconut oil and electricity was created with home-built hydroelectric power plants.

But the crisis also divided Bougainville. Different language groups, criminal gangs and other factions contributed to a lawless chaos. Armed groups affiliated with BRA looted villages and murdered islanders who were seen as opponents and traitors. At the same time, an internal resistance guerrilla was formed, fighting against BRA with support from Papua New Guinea.

Peace came in 1998. Three years later, a treaty was signed granting the region autonomous status and a non-binding referendum on independence. The referendum was held in 2019, with 98 per cent of voters throwing their support behind independence.

Bougainville is now on the brink of becoming the world’s 194th nation. The parties have agreed to decide on Bougainville’s future by 2027. But one major obstacle remains: the Panguna mine.

In a conference room in Bougainville’s capital, Buka, Ezekiel Massatt wears a worried face. He is minister of the independence implementation mission and just came back from yet another meeting with government officials in the capital of Papua New Guinea, Port Moresby.

The meeting was about formalities for when the parliament of Papua New Guinea will vote on ratification of the referendum result, a process still not finished more than four years after the referendum.

“The independence word is still a problem for the national government. They can’t quite pronounce it. I don’t even think they know how to spell it,” he says in a sarcastic manner.

In the national parliament, the issue is very sensitive. If Bougainville gains its independence, other provinces might follow. But in Bougainville, independence is nothing to compromise on.

“I’m not going to come back and tell the people of Bougainville that we’ve been hoodwinked. The national government will have to do that,” he says.

He also sends a warning.

“Our young people will say: ‘We laid down our arms, we signed the peace agreement, but you pussyfooted around with this. Why should we continue to suffer? Maybe you ought to suffer also’.”

Very few in Bougainville see a future where the region continues as part of Papua New Guinea. Bridges are already burnt. Independence is the only option.

At the same time, several experts have questioned how a region with a population of only 300,000 and a weak local economy will be able to survive on its own. Unless the main reason for the Bougainville crisis – the Panguna mine – reopens, that is.

The mine closed in 1989 after a series of sabotage attacks and has remained out of operation ever since. There is still gold and copper in the ground worth an estimated £50 billion.

No opinion poll about the future of the mine has been done in Bougainville. But of the more than 40 people all over Bougainville interviewed for this piece, a vast majority wants the mine to reopen.

In the historiography after the Bougainville crisis, it has often been claimed that the BRA fought for a permanent mine closure, to save the island from colonial extortion and environmental degradation.

But according to Australian scholar and Bougainville expert Anthony Regan, the demands from the BRA in the 80s and 90s for a permanent mine closure probably never was serious. At the time they were rather intended to pressure the Papua New Guinean government and Rio Tinto to negotiate new terms for mining.

Among the traditional landowners in Panguna, where the uprising against Rio Tinto and the mining started, support for a reopening of the mine is strong today.

“Most of us are in favor of a restart of the mine,” says Michelle Peni Kaumonu, a traditional landowner representative in the Panguna area.

“If the mine could reopen, it would help us a lot. Then Bougainville can develop.”

But given recent history, further mineral extraction is a sensitive subject.

In 2015, the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) passed a new mining act, tailored to meet the unique circumstances of post-conflict Bougainville, giving the traditional landowners the last word regarding all mining on their land. Many believe the mining act is the key to a well-managed and conflict-free mining sector.

Among them is Sam Kauona, former military commander-in-chief in the BRA and now influential politician: “Before, the mine was owned by foreigners, we never benefited from it. With a new mining law and independence, it will be different.”

Based on the mining act, ABG has turned down at least two mineral license applications for different parts of Bougainville from joint ventures involving foreign investors.

At the same time, the former Rio Tinto subsidiary operating the Panguna mine in the 80s has been given a new exploration license for Panguna. But times have changed – Rio Tinto dropped its subsidiary in 2016, and in the near future ABG will be the majority owner of the operation.

However, previous mining came with a high price, still paid by many to this day.

Politician Theonila Roka Matbob lives downstream from the open pit, and she sees the consequences of the last mining epoch every day. Polluted water flow from the mine pit into nearby rivers and erosion from the mounds of mine tailings left by Rio Tinto further contaminates the area.

She has gotten off lightly. Further downstream from the open pit, where up to 14,000 people live, the situation is worse. Arable land and rainforest have been replaced with moonscapes and swampland, a breeding ground for malaria. Fish stocks in rivers are wiped out and drinking water poisoned. “People are struggling, lacking arable land, food and clean water,” she says. “How can a hungry person focus on realizing independence?”

Still, Theonila Roka Matbob has changed her mind about mining, from being completely opposed to it.

“I would first like to see a diversified economy. Then, the mining can provide an extra boost, if it is managed responsibly,” she says.

But first, the area needs to be cleaned up. Together with 156 landowners and the Australian Human Rights Law Centre, Theonila Roka Matbob is fighting to get Rio Tinto to take responsibility for environmental degradation. So far, the mining company has agreed to at least fund a study of the damage.

“But we also need to get the company to commit itself publicly to the clean-up.”

Some 600 miles from the Panguna mine, sweat is running down the neck of Bougainvillean boxer Petronella Nokenoke. In a gym in Port Moresby, jabs, hooks and uppercuts echo against the cement walls as she prepares for the Pacific Games. She is proud to represent Papua New Guinea.

“But one day I hope to represent Bougainville, to show what we are capable of after independence,” she says.

Petronella Nokenoke was born at the end of the Bougainville crisis and has only heard her elders’ stories about it. But for her, the focus is more on the future than the conflicts of the past.

In an independent Bougainville, she wants to be involved in building a national sports movement, to give young people hope for the future and keep them away from alcohol and drugs, a growing problem on the islands.

“I want to empower young people, who will be our leaders in the future, and inspire them to do something positive with their lives.”

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