BUNER: The Frontier Mines Owners Association has rejected the recently promulgated Mines Ordinance, 2016, and decided to launch agitation against it by holding demonstrations in front of KP assembly and Chief Minister House.
Addressing a press conference in Daggar on Sunday, the association’s president Khan Bahadur Khattak, deputy general secretary Timoor Khan, and others said in the second phase of their protest against the ordinance they would halt work on mining throughout KP. They said the agitation would continue till withdrawal of the controversial ordinance.
They pointed out that under the ordinance, lease period had been decreased from 99 years to 30 years; ban had been slapped on explosives use, sub-contracting and keeping more than three leases, which, they said, was unjustified.
The association’s representatives claimed that 1,700 mine owners of KP provided jobs to about 0.5 million people and deposited Rs20 to Rs30 million to provincial kitty annually.
Published in Dawn, August 29th, 2016