A former Greenpeace Papua New Guinea representive, Joe Ka'au, who is now campaigning in his home province Gulf, the heartland of Papua New Guinea's oil and gas export pipeline, accused the movement of accepting funding from major fossil fuel corporations in exchange for a diplomatic silence.
Ka'au made the claim while challenging a plea by a San Francisco-based Greenpeace Pacific campaigner, Lafcadio Cortesi, to the PNG government.
Cortesi told local newspapers the PNG government should "invest more heavily in development of renewable energy sources, to avoid contributing to atmospheric pollution".
But Ka'au claimed Greenpeace was not doing enough about fossil fuel consumption and the nuclear waste issues in the United States and Europe. He says it was "common knowledge" that the organisation received money from a major British-based petroleum transnational.
Ka'au and his supporters have long targeted the American-based transnational Chevron over its oil and gas interests in Papua New Guinea and claim a major report on the issue was suppressed by the movement.
Greenpeace campaigner Stephanie Mills on board the Rainbow Warrior denied the allegations, saying it was not Greenpeace policy to accept money from governments or corporations.
Ka'au said Greenpeace had been in PNG for some time but had not "raised a finger against Chevron and Shell -- it is an example of preachers not practising what they preach".
The controversy followed a visit by the Rainbow Warrior and environmentalists to the Collingwood Bay area of PNG's Northern Province where the local Maisin community has taken a strong stand against large-scale logging.
Chiefs and villagers have refused moves by logging companies interested in the forests which have high biodiversity value and have instead launched their own sustainable program through their Maisin Integrated Conservation and Development (MICAD) agency.
Newspapers focused on a new solar-powered telephone system funded from the profits of locally-produced tapa, a traditional cloth made from timber bark.
Non-government organisations trying to block the 11 new timber projects claim the nation's forest policies are being "flaunted" with environmental and legal irregularities in high priority biodiversity areas such as Kikori in the Gulf, the Whiteman Range in West New Britain and the Hunstein Range in East Sepik.
The groups recently released information that identified nine concessions awarded by the PNG Forest Authority that they claim are seriously flawed environmentally or legally.
"The allocation of these forest concessions by the Forest Authority is gravely defective," said Brian Brunton, Greenpeace Pacific's forests spokesperson in Papua New Guinea and a forner National Court judge.
"There are indications of breaches of law and questions about the role of the Forest Board and the provincial forest management committees that urgently need to be
addressed," he said.
The World Wildlife Fund's representative in the Pacific, Peter Hunnan, says the NGOs have considerable practical experience in conservation and sustainable forest management.
"Each group actively supports sustainable development based on sound use of natural resources, where the benefits of developers are shared by local communities and
landowners," he says.
"But at the same time, these NGOs are committed to stopping reckless industrial logging and devastation of forests, rivers and marine systems, and the destruction of livelihoods," says Hunnan.
Critics say the Hunstein Ranges concession "makes a mockery" of the fact that Papua
New Guinea became a member of the World Heritage Convention earlier this year.
The groups are calling for a new commission of inquiry into logging to
establish how the concessions were acquired, why the projects have been
allowed to proceed despite their legal and or environmental defects,
and to identify who is responsible.
"Papua New Guinea's forests are too important to present and future
generations, and to the country's economy as a whole, to allow for the
expansion of large-scale industrial logging to new areas without wider
consultation and debate," says Max Henderson, director of the Rabaul-based Pacific Heritage Foundation.
However, the Forest Industries Association, the lobby group for the $600 million a year industry, has stepped up pressure on the PNG government to ease controls on timber companies.
Calling on the government to take drastic action to "spread the burden" or logging companies would be forced to close down.
"We call on the government to urgently change the revenue system by applying export tax at affordable rates in US dollars, remove the 70 per cent excess, defer value added tax for at least 12 months, abandon intentions to backdate levy assessments, and also abandon the proposed "processing tax" on logs for domestic processing in PNG," says industry spokesman Jim Belford.
Waging his campaign through fullpage advertisements in the national newspapers, Belford added: "Without urgent and drastic attention, there is much for the government and resource owners to lose."
David Robie is a New Zealand journalist and author specialising in Pacific political and development issues. He is currently lecturer in journalism at the University of Papua New Guinea.
