Pintea,
I don't think that Gabriel is wasting money on this project, and in spite of the complications I don't think that it leads to a conclusion of little chance of success. The truth is, there are various roadblocks these days to starting a mine anywhere in the world. This mine is potentially worth a billion dollars or more to investors, and similar amounts to the Romanians. Newmont has shown that it is willing to purchase a large minority stake in the company at $1.65 and $2.00 and the share price is now only $1.45. People need to start putting things into perspective, and eventually I think that they will, with various blockages addressed and resolved. While the destruction of some historic buildings and ancient gold mines is unfortunate, who in Romania would pay anywhere near what they are getting in return to save or preserve something comparable elsewhere in Romania, and as far as the buildings go there are crumbling historic buildings in many places?
It is easy to understand where the Hungarians are coming from in the documentary you saw. The disaster four years ago when a once in a century flood caused an Australian operated mine to leak cyanide into the Tisza should not be repeated, and of course the Hungarians have a right to assurances that it won't. A large mining company like Newmont can provide these assurances and could be forced to pay full compensation if they were wrong. Also, I am well aware of the Hungarian heritage in Transylvania and can guess that the Hungarians appreciate the historic buildings there even more than the Romanians, given that so much of Hungary's old buildings have been destroyed many times over by Austrians, Turks, and others, with little left standing from ancient times. Of course when you approach this kind of project with the perspective that it is bad, and the Hungarians have reason to, you can always find people who will make sensational quotes, and they are not necessarily representative or true. The facts indicate that the majority of locals favour the project, and for good reason.
I could give you an example of a documentary made by German visitors in Canada maybe about fifteen years ago. Journalists who knew nothing about the aboriginal people here came to a reservation and saw that it was in disrepair, with an old woman living in a hovel. They also interviewed a local chief who made many extreme and unfavourable statements about their situation, blaming everything on the government. From this, they concluded that the aboriginals were treated cruelly by the Canadian government and this was what was broadcasted on television in Germany. Unfortunately, they neglected to do any research to validate any that they said. What they did not know was that the reserve was being vandalized and burnt down every year by people who lived there, only to be rebuilt and repaired at huge expense annually by Canadian taxpayers. The woman living in a hovel had a whole house built for her that was left empty but for strange reasons that perhaps only she knows she decided to live in the hovel. In addition, the chief who had made all kinds of wild accusations could not substantiate any of them when confronted and it was immediately obvious that most if not all were completely false and the result of some kind of mental problems. So, if you approach an issue and make a documentary with the intention of hearing one side only, you can be very misled. I think that the El Dorado Rosia Montana documentary may have an element of this with its rather sensational sounding statements.
Note that Gabriel has a legal responsibility to its investors to identify risks to them. You can read about the risks in the annual report. I will review them again, although I don't have any reason to believe that anyone is being materially misled about the remaining obstacles in the way of a decision to construct the mine. |
