16 Malaysians stage protest at Lynas AGM in Sydney

The Malaysian protesters at Lynas Corporation’s annual general meeting outside the Sofitel Wentworth Hotel in Sydney on November 28. – Pic courtesy of Green Left Weekly, December 6, 2014.

Sixteen Malaysians turned up in Sydney to protest against Lynas Corporation’s annual general meeting on November 28, reports an Australian environmental journal, Green Left Weekly.

Australian rare earth mining and refining company Lynas’s toxic refinery in Gebeng, near Kuantan, began operations in 2011 despite protests from residents who feared the plant would affect some 700,000 people living within a 30km radius of it.

According to earlier reports, the refinery known as Lynas Advanced Materials Plant (LAMP) produces a by-product known as Thorium (TH). Thorium is a radioactive element that causes cancer and is easily transported through wind and water.

On November 28, members of the Kuantan-based Save Malaysia Stop Lynas (SMSL) and the Australian-based Stop Lynas Campaign staged a protest outside the Sofitel Wentworth Hotel in Sydney, where the AGM was held.

The protest was dubbed “RIP Lynas” in a reference to the company’s collapsing share price and chronic debt, reports Green Left Weekly.

Lynas shares are trading at just above 5 Australian cents.

In 2013, at the Lynas AGM, Himpunan Hijau, staged a three-day occupation outside Lynas’s headquarters in Sydney and also staged a protest outside the AGM.

SMSL chairman Tan Bun Teet, who attended the 2014 Lynas AGM as a proxy, told Green Left Weekly that the outgoing chair of the Lynas board of management, Nicholas Curtis, was forced to apologise for the collapse in the share price.

“This is the first time that he ever said sorry and I believe it sent an ominous message to those who had once believed in the dream that Lynas would become a great company. Yet he still insisted that it has a social licence from the local community to operate the plant,” Tan was quoted as saying.

“I told the AGM that if Lynas had started in its business in Malaysia with prior consultation with the local population, had been more transparent and accountable and willing to provide the relevant information, SMSL would not have existed and I would not have to be standing there to ask them questions.”

Tan said recently the Institute of Engineers Malaysia (IEM) Pahang had organised a dialogue with Lynas but his name was struck off from the list of participants at the last minute on request of the Lynas management.

“This proved that they were not sincere in wanting to engage stakeholders.”

Natalie Lowrey, who was deported from Malaysia on September 1 over her anti-Lynas activities, also attended the AGM as a proxy.

“Lynas promised its shareholders a dream but instead they sit on a sinking ship which the captain Nick Curtis has effectively now abandoned. While Lynas CEO Amanda Lacuze pushed her company's creative accounting to try and hide the desperate financial situation the company is in, several shareholders were clearly angry,” Lowrey was quoted as saying.

- TMI