SATIIM's case against the Forestry Department continued today in the Supreme Court. As we had reported yesterday, lawyers for SATIIM, the Forestry Department and U.S. Capital Energy began arguments in Supreme Court. Today those arguments concluded. Dean Barrow, attorney for SATIM told us that he is confident in a victory since today there was an admission by Fred Lumor, the attorney for U.S. Capital Energy that an environmental impact assessment was needed before any work could be done inside the Sarstoon Temash National Park.
Dean Barrow, Attorney for SATIIM
"Judging from the arguments today, I am completely confident and I believe Lois, my co-counsel, shares that confidence, especially in view of the expressed concession by Mr. Fred Lumor for U.S. Capital Energy and he is to congratulated. He, I think, was making a concession which he thought the tradition of the profession and the ethics of the profession required him to make. And that concession is of course that U.S. Capital Energy has taken advice and is now convinced, and that now accepts, that to have proceeded in the absence of an EIA was illegal.
The only argument now, as far as I can tell, is whether the judge should, not withstanding the conceded illegality, exercise his discretion not to squash because to squash would so terribly prejudice the interested party in terms of the amount of money they have actually spent and that sort of thing, that he would consider it unfair to squash not considering the illegality. I don't think that there is enough to persuade the judge.
We're trying to point out that while U.S. Capital has spent money, that was in connection with their license, in connection with, for the most part, with their production sharing agreement. And that production sharing agreement and the license both concern a contractual area that is 800,000+ acres. We in this claim, in this action, are only concerned with the acreage that constitutes the national park and that is 40,000+ acres.
So to argue that you've spent money when in fact that money has been spent to secure you the benefit, the advantage of being able to explore in all 800,000 acres, minus now only the 40,000, I don't think is a sufficient reason to say to the court please don't squash the permit which relates only to the national park."
A decision on SATIIM's application will be presented by Justice Samuel Awich on September 29th. We note that SATIIM co-manages the Sarstoon Temash National Park which is 40,000 acres, only a section of that falls within Capital Energy's exploration. That exploration block is over 868,000 acres, 1,356 square miles, 15% of the country's land mass.
