Government has come under fire for giving Hamra Oil Company Limited the go-ahead to conduct an upland oil exploration on block two and three of Lake Malawi.<\/p>\n
The new development is a departure from the company\u2019s earlier plan of exploring Lake Malawi arguing the process would be complex and too expensive if compared to the probable amount of oil present underneath.<\/p>\n
Team leader for Hamra Holdings, Grain Malunga, said in Karonga and Nkhata Bay recently that the company would by November embark on geological and geophysical mapping of sedimentary rocks, an exercise which, he said, is cheaper and sustainable for the investor.<\/p>\n
\u201cLake Malawi is a very deep lake of about 16 metres. Looking at the amount of money and machinery needed for exploration, they do not tally with the estimated available oil. This is why we have gone upland to explore the rocks which are the source of the materials that are found in the lake,\u201d Malunga said.<\/p>\n
The development has, however, not gone down well with a number of concerned groups in Karonga and Nkhata Bay, who are accusing the government and the investor of ambushing them with the plans.<\/p>\n
Rights activist Kossam Munthali of Forum for Community Services accused the government of taking short-cuts when dealing with mining investors at the expense of locals who, he said, are often deprived of information with regard to mining activities within their localities.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou will notice that there has been no prior-informed consent from the people because of the nature of consultations involved. There has been the helicopter kind of consultation where they only came to inform us and not to seek ideas and consent on the whole deal, and it is this kind of approach that was the genesis of problems at Kayerekera and elsewhere in the country,\u201d Munthali said.<\/p>\n
He also said that Malawi\u2019s oil and gas sector would continue to face challenges if the government does not review the 1983 Petroleum, Exploration and Production Act.<\/p>\n
Chairperson of the Tonga Heritage group in Nkhata Bay, Mezuwa Banda, also expressed reservations on the development. He cautioned government.<\/p>\n
\u201cLately, there have been reports that the oil explorer wants to start exploring oil in our lake, or anywhere close, and Nkhata Bay will be affected. As a cultural heritage group, we are yet to be furnished with information on our fears regarding the environment and all natural resources which we jealously guard,\u201d Banda said.<\/p>\n
He further said Tonga people depend on the lake for their livelihood; hence, the need to address outstanding issues before tampering with anything that is bound to affect aquatic life.<\/p>\n
Banda\u2019s sentiments were echoed by Karonga Youth for Justice and Development Executive Director, Steven Simsokwe, who wondered why the Environmental Impact Assessment report has never been made available to the people since the issue of oil exploration on Lake Malawi surfaced few years ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are always kept in the dark. For instance, there was kauniuni <\/em>which was conducted on taxpayers account but, up to now, no one knows the results.<\/p>\n \u201cHamra has told us of its new intentions but nothing is being mentioned about a development agreement. This should tell you that government does not care about people\u2019s interests,\u201d Simsokwe said.<\/p>\n However, Head of Oil and Gas section in the Ministry of Natural Resources, Energy and Mining, Cassius Chiwambo, downplayed the fears, saying the government is aware of all the steps that Hamra is taking.<\/p>\n \u201cThe government will advise them [as to] when to start exploration with seismic studies on the lake later. They have been advised to wait and consent was given for onshore exploration,\u201d<\/p>\n On the outdated legislation Chiwambo said there is no empirical evidence that nations have lost from the extractive industry because of old laws, giving example of Austria whose laws date back to 1876.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Government has come under fire for giving Hamra Oil Company Limited the go-ahead to conduct an upland oil exploration on block two and three of Lake Malawi. The new development is a departure from the company\u2019s earlier plan of exploring Lake Malawi arguing the process would be complex and too expensive if compared to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":55790,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55784"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55784\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":55791,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55784\/revisions\/55791"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}