Azmar’s worst nightmare

In response to Ken Moore and his lawyer Jeff Finley, who both wrote letters to the local papers blasting PaganWatch, I would like to offer them this challenge: Go to http://www.chamorro.com/paganwatch and find a false document.

On the PaganWatch website you’ll find every news article and letter to the editor that we come across via daily searches. You’ll also find copies of permits, permit requests, marketing materials, photos, letters, and copies of email correspondence. Every item is genuine. Nothing forged, altered or edited in any way.

It doesn’t matter whether it’s pro-Azmar or anti-Azmar, if it has to do with the mining controversy you’ll find it there.

Yes, freedom of speech is a wonderful privilege and is not to be taken for granted. That is why every statement and every fact that has come from PaganWatch is backed up by documents that were gathered by concerned citizens and made available so that the public and the decision-makers can have all the facts possible.

Despite Ken Moore’s interesting portrayal of PaganWatch as the shady tool of just two people, PaganWatch is in reality a group of concerned citizens who gather and share information with the public and CNMI decision-makers regarding the Northern Islands. Our membership is made up of people from the CNMI, Guam, Hawaii, the U.S. mainland and everywhere that Chamorros, Refaluwasch and true friends of the islands can be found. We all share a genuine love for the land and people of the Northern Islands and we work hard to protect our islands.

Again, I urge Ken Moore and his supporters to try to find a forged document on the PaganWatch web site. But hold on to your seats, because you might not like what you find there. For instance, you’ll find:

* Ken Moore’s email to Cinta Kaipat (whom he accuses of never having communicated with him), in which he explained how he planned to use money belonging to a WWII Museum non-profit corporation to pay for his pozzolan mining project.

* A Saipan Tribune story with a picture of Cinta Kaipat talking with Ken Moore.

* Ken Moore’s Aug. 1, 2003 email to Don Farrell (with Cinta Kaipat copied in), a profanity-filled tirade in which he refers to a CNMI congressman as a “big ass snorting and belching pig,” to the MPLA board as “[at best] individuals who’ve run a franchise operation like Wendy’s or McDonalds.”

* Azmar’s Marketing Brochure that lifts its technical information from another website, and that freely uses the test results of Construction Technologies Laboratories—results that, according to the lab technician who did the work, Ken Moore was not authorized to use because he didn’t pay the $1000 bill for the test.

* The Azmar/MPLA Deal Calculator, developed by PaganWatch and based on Azmar’s permit terms and CNMI tax laws, that demonstrates that the deal is EXTREMELY one-sided in favor of Ken Moore and would be a major exploitation of the Marianas Public Land Trust.

* Azmar’s own financial projections that projects a three-year $40.5 million profit for Ken Moore (in addition to sharing a $600,000 salary with one other officer), followed by $47.2 million per year thereafter, while the CNMI would get only $18.7 million for three years and then $9.7 million per year. Further there are few funds for local jobs and no plans for environmental damage mitigation—no funds for reforestation, no environmental studies, no marine biologists, no agriculturalists, no one to monitor anything.

* A Saipan Tribune story quoting Coastal Resources Management’s Regulatory Board, made up of officials from CRM, the Division of Environmental Quality, Department of Lands and Natural Resources, Historic Preservation Office, Department of Public Works, Commonwealth Utilities Corp., and Department of Commerce, as saying they were never contacted by Azmar for a major siting permit, which entails a study that will determine the impact of its proposed pozzolan mining on the environment, which means that Azmar has no environmental study.

* News reports of the signature campaign that yielded nearly 600 signatures in a day and a half, including most of the Northern Islands residents, that brought to Senate President Adriano’s desk the petition asking the Senate to approve the House of Representatives Act to study the Pagan mining potential before issuing any permits, and the subsequent stories of how he ignored the petition, shelved the House Act, and then was quoted as saying he’s throwing it in the trash.

You’ll also find lots of pictures and information on how pozzolan is mined and what irresponsible and incompetent mining can do to the environment—the kind of mining an inexperienced company with no environmental impact interest can do.

What you won’t find on PaganWatch is any evidence of Azmar mining experience, any detailed operating plan, a detailed business plan, a realistic timeline to get through all the permits and permissions required, or any evidence of actual funds set aside in advance to make good on the promises made to the Northern Islands residents.

Provide us with those documents Mr. Moore, and they will be published on the front page of PaganWatch.

Despite what Ken Moore and his supporters say, PaganWatch is of the people, by the people and for the people. We find the truth, tell the truth and we back it with evidence. This is why Ken Moore and his attorney’s attempts to intimidate us will not work.

So go ahead Ken Moore and supporters, accept the challenge. Please. Visit http://www.chamorro.com/paganwatch and find a false document…

Peter J. Pangelinan Perez
PaganWatch