IT'S NO GAMBLE, INDUSTRY MINISTER SAYS
Coal project moves into high gear
  VICTORIA (CP) — The $2.5-billion development of the British Columbia northeast coal fields is boring full speed ahead despite fears the mining companies might not have the necessary financing.
   "It’s not any gamble as far as I’m concerned,” Don Phillips. B.C.’s bombastic industry minister, said of the provincial government’s $480 million investment in the project.
   "Everything is coming together better than I anticipated and I have no doubt whatsoever about any of the negative questions that have been raised — financing and not being finished on time.”
   A tunnel blasting ceremony was held this week on the B.C. Railway’s $500 million, 129-kilometre railway extension into the northeast coal fields. Construction is proceeding on the $170-million instant coal town of Tumbler Ridge as well as on the $275-million coal port at Ridley Island near Prince Rupert on B.C.’s north coast.
   “All the contracts let are on time, within budget and the project is clicking along very nicely,” the 52-year-old minister said in booming booster-club tones.
 The
 Wednesday March 24, 1982 Pripce George, British Columbia
 Phillips said he isn't worried about the estimated $1 billion needed by Teck Corp. of Vancouver and Denison Mines of Toronto to get their mines into production.
 The companies have their interim financing of about $100 million, he said, and are negotiating for the rest.
 "They never anticipated putting the senior financing together until June.”
 He said the financing will be handled by the “conservative Canadian banking establishment " which will spin some off to
European. Japanese and American banks.
Phillips also is emphatic that the provincial government will not step in to guarantee the financing for the project which covers a good chunk of his South Peace River riding.
The two mining companies have agreed to sell a total of 7.7 million tons of coal annually to Japanese steel companies over a 15-year period begining late in 1983. Both sales agreements contain provisions for five-year extensions to 20 years.
Phillips, a former car dealer, hints the steel companies are
prepared to taken an equity position in one or both of the companies.
  "There are ticklish negotiations, with seven key mills involved.” he says, quickly adding that "I did not say that the Japanese steel industry arc talking about participation.”
   He says the taxpayers’ investment is well protected even if the project falls through but refuses to say how: "1 will tell you in due course."
  Insiders say the companies have put up a bond for $700 million which would be paid to the government in event of default.
  Meanwhile, the government’s environmental coal guidelines steering committee reports that Denison has submitted its detailed environmental impact assessment and the committee will decide in three weeks if more information is needed before sending it to the various ministries for full review, a process which takes about six to eight weeks.
  Committee chairman Jake McDonald said Teck expects to submit its detailed assessment within a month.
Polis loses hockey-stick legal battle
    A Prince George resident has lost a hockey-related lawsuit in Pittsburgh.
    Greg Polis, a former National Hockey League left winger, was named with the New York Rangers in a suit filed by 23-year-old David Brown of Elizabeth Township, a Pittsburgh suburb.
     Brown agreed to accept $27,500 after he claimed he became an epileptic as a result of being struck by Polis with a hockey stick in a game in November, 1978.
    In a story by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Brown admits he shouted obscenities at the Rangers during the game with the Pittsburgh Penguins.
    Polis, who moved to Prince George eight years ago, had a 10-year NHL career with the Penguins, St. Louis Blues, Rangers and Washington Capitals.
     He retired from the Capitals early last year after struggling with an injury arising from a broken leg suffered against the Vancouver Canucks in March, 1979.
     The 30-year-old Polis is still embroiled in a lawsuit against the Capitals, who he maintains failed to provide competent medical treatment of his injured leg.
    Polis filed a $5 million breach-of-contract suit against the team, contending Capitals’ owner Abe Poliin didn’t supply adequate medical advice.
    The action contends team officials ignored Polis’ complaints about the injury and the suit charges an examination in January, 1980, revealed the fracture hadn’t healed properly. Polis says the Capitals had told him "to play himself back into shape.”
    Polis, who was born in Alberta, won a battle recently when NHL president John Ziegler ordered a third doctor must be appointed to examine Polis and make a decisive diagnosis of the injury.
     Conflicting opinions have already been delivered by doctors for Polis.and the Capitals.
 Pay-TV winner challenges B.C.
   VANCOUVER (CP) - The company licensed federally to provide pay TV throughout Canada says it has no intention of applying to Victoria for a licence to operate in B.C.
    Don MacPherson, president of First Choice Canada Communications Corp., said Tuesday the company will not comply with demands from the B.C. and Quebec governments that companies granted licences to operate pay TV nationally also apply for provincial licenses.
    “As far as we’re concerned, we have a licence, issued by the CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission),” MacPherson said in an interview. “ \/e believe that B.C., Quebec, or any other province does not have jurisdiction over a national pay TV licence.”
    World View Television Ltd., a B.C-based company also licensed to provide service in the province, will comply, however.
    The commission licensed six companies last week to provide pay TV in Canada. B.C. would be serviced by three of them. First Choice’s national general channel, a national culture channel, and World View’s multilingual regional channel.
    B.C. communications Minister Pat McGeer maintains — as does the province of Quebec — that cable television is under provincial jurisdiction and therefore pay TV, which will be offered on cable, is under provincial authority-
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JAPANESE HOUSING
Lumber sales seen
  VICTORIA (CP) - Federal Trade Minister Ed Lumley had encouraging news Wednesday, for Premier Bennett and Industry Minister Don Phillips, about the future of B.C. lumber exports to Japan.
  Lumley, who recently returned from Japan, said lumber exports to that country should increase since 600,000 new houses are being constructed in Japan, during the first six months of this year and the softwood-plywood standards are expected to
 change to allow the entry of B.C. plywood into the country.
   Lumley also said, although nothing specific was promised, he is hopeful an auto parts plant will be built in B.C. and a major manufacturing and assembly plant will be built in Canada.
   Meanwhile, Lumley said he assured the Japanese about guarantee of supply for northeast coal, and promised that the Prince Rupert facilities will be ready in time for the 1983 coal shipment date.
Doom-and-qloom fears dismissed
Citizen photo by llrork Culilr
                   The calendar says it’s spring and now the pussy willows have made an appearance, so the long, dreary winter must finally be coming to At last!	an end. Nicole Jewell found an armload of the traditional harbingers
                   of spring near Prince George Senior Secondary School.
$50,000 IN DONATIONS
Aaron to get treatment
by LESLIE PERRY Staff Reporter
    More than $50,000 in donations from all over B.C. will allow a Mackenzie boy to go to West Germany for treatment for his rare skin disease.
   Fern and Robert Zimmer appealed for $40,000 to send their four-year-old son Aaron to the exclusive clinic which costs $•100 a day.
   Mother and son fly from Edmonton to Germany April 7.
    In a telephone interview from her home Zimmer said about $25,000 came from Mackenzie alone and one Vancouver man gave $10,000.
   Zimmer was interviewed in Vancouver by BCTV and The Sun while she was there recuperating from a mastectomy operation.
   Her son suffers from Epidermolysis Bullosa, a disfiguring disease causing painful blisters that in extreme cases can grow together on the extremities like webbing.
    Aaron was born with the disease which his mother has also.
   The Zimmers began appealing for funds two months ago when they learned a bed was being held for their son. Treatment costs $11,000 a month and usually lasts three months.
   Zimmer, 27, said they got money from all over B.C. and as far away as Thunder Bay, Ontario. Donations included $2,400 from a Mackenzie elementary school.
    She will stay with her son at the clinic where he’ll be put on a special diet and treated with ointments. His dressings must be changed every three hours.
   Each EB victim requires different treatment but the diet is essentially porridge, clear soup, rice or noodles, vitamins. herbal teas, mineral water, all
  fresh, no frozen foods, boiled poultry or calf's heart and unsalted butter.
  A special bread made from oil. not shortening, can be eaten any time and no alcohol or caffeine is allowed.
  Ointments used cost $000 a jar and can be bought only at the clinic.
  According to doctors in Germany, EB is partially aggravated by stress, so patients have their own rooms in the clinic.
  The clinic has treated about 75 Canadians and there are 15 there now. accord-
AARON ZIMMER
 ing to Zimmer. There are no North American clinics and few in Europe.
   The clinic, in Michelbach 40 km from Frankfurt, is run by Rumanian biochemist Dr. Pavel Kozak who claims to have visual evidence from former patients he can cure the disease.
   Kozak was in Edmonton recently to see families of EB children. He was on a Canadian tour to persuade medical and government officials to open a clinic in Ontario. The Zimmers talked to him there through an interpreter.
   The 1981 B.C. Lions Society "Timmy” is being treated in the clinic with $80,000 raised to send Chris Shirley of Port Coquitlam.	. ,
    Part of that money was considered for Aaron by the society but is being held, pending outcome of the boy’s treatment. A Mackenzie Lions Club spokesman said Chris is responding to treatment.
   Zimmer, who is taking her first trip overseas, is optimistic about the treatment but nervous at the prospect of travelling alone.
    Robert Zimmer, a first-aid firefighter at B.C. Forest Products, is staying home to look after their other child, one-year-old Krystle.
    His wife, who spent six weeks in Vancouver for her own treatment, must indefinitely attend a cancer clinic here every three months.
   Zimmer says her son’s condition is stable and her home remedy of ointments and a bland diet has not improved his condition.
   Dermatologists in Canada say they're impressed with the results, calling Kozak’s a simple process and not a miracle cure. His methods aren’f recognized by medical colleges in Canada.
   Zimmer says the response from people — most of whom have never met the Mackenzie couple — was amazing.
    "I never expected all this money. Some people wrote cheques for $500 and we never knew them.”
   Aaron's mother says her journey to Germany will not be a holiday and she looks forward to coming home.
   "I just want a normal family again. With my illness and Aaron’s we’ve been through a lot — but we'll stay away until he’s okay.”
   VANCOUVER (CP) - The chances of a depression are one in a million, and the United States and Canada "may already have passed the bottom of the recession," Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman said Tuesday.
    Almost 1.000 business people packed a downtown hotel ballroom — at $30 a ticket — for a luncheon speech by the leading exponent of the free enterprise system.
    Friedman, a strong supporter of U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s attempt to reduce government spending, said he has maintained for almost 30 years that the U.S. economy is "depression-proof.”
    He said that if Reagan can overcome opposition from free-spending politicians and "experts who know things that are not so,” unemployment will soon begin to fall and the U.S. prime interest rate may be 10 or 11 per cent by the end of the year, after an “erratic” decline.
    Friedman also said he did not want to be too optimistic, adding that five years from now the inflation rate will be “less than five per cent or more than 25 per cent, but it’s very unlikely to be anywhere between.”
    Nonetheless, he said the broad sweep of historical trends favors the Reagan economic approach, and “the odds are a
Even toilet malfunctions
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) -Columbia’s astronauts, orbiting with nagging technical problems, plunged into a second day of troubleshooting today. Mission Control pared their work schedule and delaying a key test of the shuttle’s robot arm.
    The goal for Day Three: "Get the crew back on the straight and narrow" for the tasks ahead.
    Even before astronauts Jack Lousma and Gordon Fullerton had awakened, flight officials tinkered with the work schedule and decided to delay a grab-and-lift test of the Canadian-built 15-metre arm in Columbia’s cargo bay.
    Officials had told the exhausted pilots to sleep at least an extra hour this morning, vowing: “We won’t call you; you call us.” Predictably, that didn’t hold up and a sheepish capsule communicator David Griggs said at 8:22 a.m.: “We just couldn’t wait any longer.”
    Lousma said the shuttle commode was out of order, but in any event he and Fullerton slept better on Tuesday.
  little better than even that the good scenario is going to come out.”
    Meanwhile, most British Columbians have never been exposed to as severe a recession as the one they are now experiencing, the chief economist with the British Columbia Central Credit Union told a Vancouver luncheon Tuesday.
   Economist Richard McAlary told members of the Downtown Vancouver Association that 54 per cent of the province’s population is between the ages of 19 and 39 and therefore has never been exposed to more troubled economic times.
Guatemala: 'Rigged vote sparked coup'
   GUATEMALA CITY (AP) - Military officers who ousted Guatemala's right-wing president and installed a three-man junta say they acted because elections earlier this month were rigged to prolong an unpopular and corrupt regime.
    Tanks and soldiers ringed the presidential palace in the coup Tuesday but no violence was reported. It was the first military takeover in 19 years in Guatemala, Central America’s most populous nation racked by hundreds of political killings and a leftist rebellion.
    Junta leader Efrain Rios Montt, a retired general who ran unsuccessfully for president eight years ago, told reporters he will dissolve congress and rule by decree with junta colleagues Gen. Horacio Maldonado Shad and Col. Francisco Gor-dillo.
    In a televised address later, Rios Montt promised reforms and asked leftist guerrillas to lay down their arms, saying "subversion should not continue.”
    Rios Montt said ousted President Gen. Fernando Remeo Lucas Garcia fled the country by plane. It was not known where he sought sanctuary. Nor was there any word from Lucas Garcia's elected successor, Gen. Angel Anibal Guevara, who had been scheduled to take office July 1. The U.S. Embassy in Guatemala said it had received word that Guevara was safe.
    Guevara, a close associate of Lucas Garcia, was elected March 7 amid widespread allegations that the voting was rigged.
HERMAN
“Which credit card d'you want — R.G. Williams. Miss S. Peters or the Rev. J. Thomas?”
FEATURED TODAY
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 The party's over?
  As about 15,000 protesters reviled him in nearby streets. President Reagan defended his economic plan and said he is hurt by accusations he lacks compassion for the poor. Page 2.
 Index
Bridge............................I!)
Business.......................S, 9
 City, B.C..................’I, 7, 25
 Classified...................lti-21
Comics...........................Id
 Community panes.......23. 21
Crossword......................IS
Kditorial.........................I
THE WEATHER
NOW HEAR THIS
 Kntertainment......10. 11. 28
Family............................ti
Horoscopes.....................28
Hume column..................7
International...................2
.Movies...........................1(1
National..........................5
 Sports..............1.M5, 33, 31
Television.......................18
   The skies today should be sunny with increasing cloud in the afternoon. Thursday the forecast is for cloud with occasional sunny periods.
   High today is expected to reach G with a low of -4. Thursday the high should be 7. Low for Tuesday was -12 and high was 6 A trace of precipitation fell Tuesday. Whether it was rain or snow might have been a moot point in some areas.
   The sun sets at 6:28 p.m. today and rises at 6:04 a.m. Thursday.
Sadrack says
-JSn'g,
 •	Someone at the Fifth Avenue Pub made this helpful announcement to patrons Saturday night: "Would the owner of the brown two-tone Honda parked in the loading zone please move it as it is being towed away right now.”
 •	Some people just can’t win. A man working at Pink Mountain, on Kilometre 150 of the Alaska Highway, couldn’t start his truck on a frigid morning recently so he started a fire underneath the engine compartment and went into his cabin to keep warm. When he looked outside, he found the vehicle was on fire, and was able to salvage the tires only. Later that day, he was driving with the gravel box of a truck raised upright when it caught a set of overhead wires, and four utility poles fell totheground. When he returned to the work camp he discovered someone had stolen the tires from the truck which had burned. Disgusted with his bad luck, he decided to return to Prince George, but he ran out of gas....
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