People Web International

By Stephen Benner, PWI Reporter New Zealand

Further to the earlier article on oil exploration protests… exploration has stopped in the meantime because of those water-borne protests by a flotilla of boats co-ordinated by Greenpeace.

For the 12,000-strong Maori tribal members of the East Region of the North Island East (Te Whanau a Apanui), last year's announcement of the Brazilian company Petrobras' exploration intentions coincided with the deadly explosion on the Deepwater Horizon exploration well in the Gulf of Mexico.

Fearing impacts on their inshore fisheries in the event of a Gulf-style oil spill anywhere out to 110 kilometres from shore, the tribal leaders put out a national call for support.

It was that call, says Greenpeace, that led to last week's brilliantly choreographed protests, which have temporarily stopped the Petrobas ship Orient Explorer from operating.

"Apanui put out a call to the rest of the country. We responded to that. We're not here strategically," says Greenpeace New Zealand's climate change campaigner Simon Boxer.

It appears that the fear of both the NZ Government, embarrassed because it invited Petrobras here, and the New Zealand oil exploration lobby, is that last week's actions will be enough to send not only the Brazilians, but other would-be explorers packing.

Under a locally conceived, two-pronged "No New Coal or Oil" campaign based on Greenpeace International's opposition to the ongoing use of fossil fuels, Greenpeace New Zealand has focused protest not only on Gulf of Mexico-style accidents, but also on the extraction of any more hydrocarbons at all.

One of their key complaints is that the offshore economic zone around the coastline of the entire country is being opened up to exploration before regulations are in place to govern activities like deep-sea mining.

"The process has been wrong from the beginning," says Simon Boxer, suggesting the Government would be doing Petrobras a favour by revoking its permits. "They (Petrobras) would probably be quite glad if it could be suspended for a while." He said from Opotiki (near East Cape) : "The opposition here is extraordinary. Everyone's united and determined."

In the overall scheme of things for Petrobras the Raukumara Basin exploration is, at best, a long shot, and whether the unwelcomed Brazilian will be determined to keep exploring in the face of such opposition remains to be seen.

-- by Stephen Benner - PWI Reporter New Zealand - new.zealand@peoplewebinternational.com