Ok Tedi eases school’s housing problem

Caption: The new house built for Ningerum Primary school

 

The government-owned Ningerum Primary School has received another facility at its campus – thanks to Ok Tedi Mining Limited.

This time it is a modern high-set teacher's house, built at a cost of K200, 000.

The school, located at Ningerum station on the Tabubil-Kiunga highway, services the township and surrounding villages. 

And in an added bonus to the local communities, the contract for building the house had been awarded to their own landowner company, Hore Binkia.

Head teacher Henry Gugu was grateful to OTML for recognising and addressing the school's need for more teachers' houses.

"The only houses we have are three institutional houses that are in the school," he said.

"The rest are government houses.

"And we rely heavily on the district administration for houses."

OTML community support executive manager Leonard Lagisa who handed over the house to the school said the new house signified OTML's continued commitment to the affected communities in the Highway region and the improvement of important services in education and health.

He said a lot of money had been generated from the Ok Tedi mine but there was still no tangible development taking place in the province.

He said OTML could assist in a little way but it was the responsibility of all stakeholders including communities to work together for the improvement of service delivery.

OTML would want to see more infrastructure development taking place in the province.

Funding for the three-bedroom high timber house came from OTML's mine waste tailings project  (MWTP) which was initiated in 2006 after OTML and Tabubil-Kiunga highway villagers agreed for a pyrite concentrate pipeline to be built from the Ok Tedi mill facilities along the road to Bige where special pits are located under the water bed to contain the waste.

OTML has allocated K2.1 million for community infrastructure projects under the MWTP.

 So far six teachers' houses and two aid posts have already been built in various villages while another two double classrooms, a library and two teachers' houses are under construction.