Moore: We’ve lost many investors

Azmar International Trading Co. has lost many investors due to the CNMI’s delayed action on its mining proposal.

“We’ve lost many investors. We’ve been out here for two and a half years. When you’re talking to people, you’re talking tens of millions of dollars. They want what they want when they want it. They don’t really have a great deal of patience,” said visiting Azmar president Kenneth Moore in an interview.

He said that while he has no control over the local situation, he said he hopes that authorities would realize that “there is a need to seize the moment.”

Moore, who is currently seeking a two-year permit to mine pozzolan from Pagan, said he has been asked by outsiders whether the CNMI is a business-friendly community, based on his experience.

“It’s difficult to answer because I believe in the CNMI. I always have. I fell in love with these islands when I came here in 1998,” he said.

He said that back then he had “no intention whatsoever in engaging in business [in the CNMI].” But upon learning about a rich deposit of pozzolan—a high-grade cement additive—on Pagan, he considered taking a risk.

Moore said that Azmar, a company that was formed mainly to do the pozzolan mining, “is taking a risk on the market.”

He said that, through his connections, he has identified investors and convinced them to put their money on the project. But then, these investors could not wait long and keep their money idle, he said.

Moore said investors he has talked with often inquire about local government’s politics. “They’d say, ‘Okay, Ken that’s great stuff. We want buy it, but if we buy, is this going to be interrupted politically? Is the flow of this, [pozzolan] going to be politically interrupted?’”

Moore said this is what is difficult about the situation, stressing that people throughout the CNMI need to recognize that the world market place is not stagnant. “It doesn’t sit around and wait.”

The issuance of a mining permit for Pagan has been held up due to the presence of an existing permit, given to J.G. Sablan, which has seven more years to mine pozzolan on Pagan, according to the Marianas Public Lands Authority.

“They still have seven years more to go in the existing permit. We’ re just trying to settle a default in payment,” said MPLA board chair Ana Demapan-Castro when asked whether J.G. remains the mining permit holder on Pagan.

“ Right now, they are in default perse based on the letter that we sent them,” she added.

To date, she said JG has paid off over $100,000 in overdue base rent.

She said the negotiation is now down to discussions on payment of royalty fees, which amount to some $300,000.