If you are intrigued by the continuing saga of news about Vatukoula, Fiji, here is an (edited) extract from a report about the company, Westech that is buying the mine (The link to this report is broken. Here is what I  edited when I was able to access the site.):

Run by Brian and Amelia Wesson, Westech International Pty Ltd is a resource and energy company based in Sydney. Brian Wesson said the company designs mines and power stations. “It is a small company; we have about 20 employees dotted around the country. We take on a lot of contracts for various jobs. We also have interest in other mining companies, such as Queensland Mining Corporation.”

Wesson is no stranger to Vatukoula—having spent five years in the mine from 1993. “I know Vatukoula well. We rebuilt the plant in 1994. We know the people well. All the people that were running Vatukoula were people who were working for me before. I suppose that gives us the confidence that we can actually turn it around and take it forward,” he said. His own background includes Rand Mine in South Africa where he had worked for 17 years and Emperor Mines. Wesson says they will look at the surface operations, look at the geology of the mine, re-look at development, and put a new strategy together to look at reopening the mine . Wesson says the surface operations at Vatukoula include the old dumps and the stockpiles, which may still have some gold in them. “We will re-treat the old tailings (crushed rocks). A lot of those tailing dumps were treated many years ago when the plant was inefficient. So you can recover some gold out of that.”

While the mining presses of Johannesburg and North America are filled with this news, the local press in Fiji  is silent. This is the main news item in Fiji:

LORD Mayor Ratu Peni Volavola has defended the Suva City Council’s purchase of a luxury Landcruiser vehicle worth over $140,000 that was bought for his official use. Ratu Peni said the mayoral vehicle had to be changed every three years and the issue of low mileage was not the deciding factor in the purchase of a new one. His comments come in the wake of criticism from a ratepayer who, through the open column in The Fiji Times, pointed out that the money used to buy the Lord Mayor’s vehicle could have been used to improve Suva’s roads instead. Ratu Peni said it was unfair for people to pass comments like that and he was disappointed when he read the column. Ratu Peni said he had asked for a smaller and less expensive vehicle like a Pathfinder but the councilors decided that they wanted to purchase a vehicle that would be a “status of symbol. “I don’t like to blow my own horn. I like to consider myself a humble person, he said.
At least he will look good in that new Landcruiser as he bounces over bad roads to the mine’s reopening ceremony.

The absence of official Fiji news is puzzling. One report  I found says:

The interim Cabinet in Fiji has agreed to support the sales process after Emperor agreed to provide joint social and environmental assistance to the Vatukoula community arising from closure of the mine which was Fiji’s largest single private employer.

I wonder what “joint social and environmental assistance” is. They lost $200 million and got but $16 for selling the mine. I bet they have not a cent to spare. I bet they are breathing a sigh of relief and have no more intention than I have of ever going near Fiji again. They will probably buy a new Land Rover in Johannesburg and leave Fiji to the LORD Mayor and his Landcruiser. Here are some additional weekend thoughts about this mine, about mining, people who get big new cars, and about “little people.”
International Law: On Thursday, over dinner, an old friend waxed enthusiastic about somebody she met from the United Nations and who intends to work to promulgate an “international law of mining.” Good wine precluded us from fleshing out the details. Now sober, I propose that a good test for any nascent “international law of mining” would be Fiji and Vatakoula. Here we have a situation ripe for international good deeds: (1) restore democracy to the country; (2) clean up the mine’s environment; (3) put the out-of-work workers to work in a “clean” industry; (4) reopen the mine with government funds; (5) retrain the workers to do computer simulations of the new tailings heap leach operations; (6) any other ideas you may propose. I wonder if such a law were to come into being, if Westech would have purchased what is left. Maybe they would have, on the basis of a grant from the United Nations to do one or more of the things I list above. Or maybe the old owners would be facing a charge in the Hague. Or maybe the mining cleanup squad from the UN would be preparing to go into the “danger zone.” China would probably veto it.

Mining Companies Social Responsibilities. This is a good case as any of a mining company getting the hell out of the way as fast as it can when profits disappear. And who can blame them? That is the way the world works. How do my liberal friends and those CanadaWatch blogs propose we structure things so this kind of flee-for-profit situation is avoided. By what principles of equity and reason can we hold the off-shore mining company responsible for the environmental and social consequences of getting out of a mine that is loosing money?

Government Policy and Action. Not to be too cruel, but it seems to me that all the politician or those with a desire to govern in Fiji are far more interested in grabbing power, getting rich, and playing soccer than in formulating decent social policy and protecting the environment. My old father always used to say that a people get the government they deserve. I bet he would repeat himself in this instance.

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