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Indigenous mining share deal

Mark Davis

1 April 2008 - More than 2500 of the country's most disadvantaged Aborigines will become shareholders in an Australian Securities Exchange-listed mining company under an innovative native title agreement.

The Martu people, traditional owners of a swathe of Western Australia's western desert, have thrashed out a deal with Reward Minerals Ltd allowing the company to mine potash at Lake Disappointment. In return, the deal gives the Martu an equity stake of more than 10 per cent of the company, delivering not just royalty payments from the project but ownership and involvement.

Reward's share price jumped 30 per cent yesterday as investors punted that the deal would open the way for the company to take advantage of high world prices for potash, a mineral used in producing fertilisers.

The deal was negotiated for the Martu by two new Aboriginal leaders - a former investment banker, Joe Procter, and the one-time Australian rules footballer Clinton Wolf, who is the chief executive of the Western Desert Lands Aboriginal Corporation.

They believe that governments have failed to deliver the services remote Aboriginal communities need, while mining deals in the past have amounted to little more than corporate welfare.

A statement by Mr Wolf and two Martu elders, Teddy Biljabu and Brian Samson,
said: "The Martu are a proud group of desert people who possess significant native- title rights. We expect honesty and fair value in exchange for our co-operation, along with an underlying assumption of equity in any project on our land."

Mr Procter said the equity component was the way of the future in mining negotiations.

"Indigenous groups have never before received equity due to many factors including lack of access to resources, limited commercial experience of land councils who represent them, their own in-fighting and the drip feed of payments from mining companies which ensures they are never quite able to get on their feet and put up a fight," Mr Procter said.

The Martu live at the four remote communities of Parnngurr, Punmu, Jigalong and Kunawarritji, more than 1000 kilometres from Perth. They were awarded native title over 136,000 square kilometres of land in 2003.

The company's director, Michael Ruane, said the Martu would be issued with options for 7 million shares at an exercise price of $0.50 a share. At yesterday's closing share price of $1.25, that means the options already put the Martu $5.3 million ahead

Source: Sydney Morning Herald

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