This is from the Yukon News.
Receiver stands by BYG
by Amy Steele
News reporter
The receiver for B.Y.G. Natural Resources Inc. won't comment on how or if his client will pay a $300,000 fine for three
violations of the Yukon Waters Act at its Mount Nansen mine site.
"If you understand the law there are processes that are followed," said Gordon Ward-Carney, receiver with D. Manning and
Associates Inc. out of Vancouver.
"A decision will be made after the transcripts are gone over. One of the possibilities is an appeal."
The reclamation bill for the mine site is estimated at between four to eight million.
Ward-Carney also wouldn't comment on where that money will come from.
"That company is in receivership so it's in a holding pattern," he said.
Ward-Carney alleged that the court process had been unfair to B.Y.G.
"From what I understand of the process if you want to make an example out of someone who's down and out why not pick on
B.Y.G.?" he asked.
However, he said the court hearing and subsequent fines "have no effect on what we're doing and the plans we have", said
Ward-Carney.
Bankruptcy isn't in the cards.
In fact the company would like to continue gold mining operations at its Mount Nansen mine site in the future, said
Ward-Carney.
"We are currently in the process of selling non-mining assets. That cash will be used to pay the secured creditors. Any surplus
cash will be spent on repairing the mill," said Ward-Carney.
As well, the company is "in the process of raising fresh capital."
Then the company will appraise money owed to unsecured creditors, said Ward-Carney.
The company owes four million to creditors, he said.
"The intent is to raise fresh capital and after that is done, to expand the ore reserves and then, sometime in the future the goal is
to go back into production," said Ward-Carney.
In the meantime there are 11 people "doing nothing but monitoring the property."
"They're doing precisely what the government wants them to do," said Ward-Carney.
When Territorial Court judge Heino Lilles gave the fine to B.Y.G. last week, he said the company showed an attitude of "raping
and pillaging the Yukon."
However, Ward-Carney argued that the company put $39 million into the Yukon and took out $22 million.
"It's not as if they put in a dollar and took out three trillion," he said.
"And I haven't met one employee who didn't say they were a good employer."
Another issue that came up at the trial were the ongoing environmental problems at the site, including the stability of the tailings
dam and seepage of toxic chemicals through the dam or into groundwater.
"The dam is not unstable," said Ward-Carney. "There's not enough water in the tailings pond to spit in."
And the cyanide in the tailings pond is currently being treated, he said.
During the trial, a Professor of Biology at Waterloo University told the court that the fish population in Dome Creek, which has
headwaters at the mine site, had been "severely depleted."
There have never been fish in the creek, said Ward-Carney.
"Someone's been smoking something funny," he said.
BYG was convicted of violating its water licence by exceeding the allowable limits of cyanide in its tailings pond between May
30, 1997, and January 27, 1998.
The company was also convicted of not submitting a required arsenic stability report and for discharging toxic effluent on
October 16, 1997, contrary to its water licence.
Lilles ordered the company to pay the maximum fine of $100,000 for each offence.
The open-pit gold mine, located about 60 kilometres west of Carmacks, used cyanide in its flotation gold-recovery process.
BYG ceased operations at its Mount Nansen site on February 19, 1999, and it went into receivership on March 22.
Both the Toronto Stock Exchange and the Alberta Stock Exchange suspended trading of BYG shares in April.
And the Alberta exchange's regulatory department is currently looking into the company's affairs.
Sincerely,
Al Cern |
