Pacific / Papua New Guinea

Frustration builds around PNG's LNG project - rights group

12:23 pm on 11 May 2018

An Australian human rights NGO says there is frustration in Papua New Guinea's Hela province at the lack of benefits from the huge LNG project.

Photo: RNZI/Johnny Blades

Jubilee Australia has just issued the second of several reports into the $US19 billion dollar ExxonMobil project.

The first report detailed the failure of the scheme, and the PNG Government, to deliver of huge promises of dramatic economic growth, many more jobs and much higher wages.

Now Jubilee's Luke Fletcher says in Hela, where most of the project is sited, people have not received any royalty payments and none of the promised infrastructure improvements have been made.

"Now those promises were probably overinflated but the point is that people were expecting it," Mr Fletcher said.

"Quality of life is not good, it has not improved a great deal and they are really angry.

"They are also angry about the royalties too so there is a lot of tension, there is a lot of frustration. And it's the sort of thing - nobody knows what is going to happen but it certainly could deteriorate at any moment," he said.

Listen to the interview with Luke Fletcher on RNZ Pacific's Dateline