Post by seacid on Mar 5, 2008 18:08:29 GMT 8
NICKEL AND DIE
BY IVAN SARENAS
Up until about 10:00 am of October 3, 2007, Armin Marin was a living saint.
He was a freshly elected municipal councilor who was sponsoring decidedly environmental bills.
He was President of the Parish Pastoral Counsil.
He was building the roof of the church.
He was building classrooms.
He was an NGO worker in the extreme sense. In a land claim survey for Sibuyan”s indigenous people, he extended their coverage well into land his family owned.
He was an amateur, under-qualified philanthropist. Following his father”s business model, he would finance someones”s pig breeding venture but would not take a piglet as payback. The piglet would go to another beneficiary. Most of his salary would go to loans for the more needy. He organized donation drives for the provision of school desks.
He was a tickler of children.
He was a smiler.
He was a lover of trees.
But he always wasn’t so. He grew up on an island extraordinarily abundant with forest resources. As most everyone in the island, his family was engaged in the “lumber” business. Being the eldest of 10, he became the de facto assistant to his father.
Notwithstanding this occupation, the Marin family was a case study on the positive powers of education. From wood money, all the ten siblings managed to get tertiary education. Education that made them somewhat sensitive to the real costs of their empowerment. When logging became problematic, it was necessary and easy for them to give up.
For a period, Armin floated between jobs. A boat operator for a fishing cooperative some of the time, a paramilitary soldier the next, until Kabang Kalikasan ng Pilipinas came along (this is the NGO known worldwide as the World Wide Fund for Nature, WWF) giving Armin his first stable fob. Happy to finally get a regular paycheck, he also got more than he bargained for – a deeper kind of education. Consequently, he acquired a worldview and an idea of his place in the family of things.
With the zeal of a man with a mission, he ran for councilor…but lost, allegedly because of credibility problems. Who would listen to a former logger preaching conservation?
Yet he soldiered on, doing deeds consistent with his new viewpoint. Like most of the local staff, he had become more than an employee. He was galvanized into one of the most passionate advocates for conservation. The transformation was complete. It became a lifelong adherence, as he continued his efforts even when the NGO had to terminate the project for lack of funding.
Sibuyan, as Armin came to realize, is extremely special.
If you looked at the map of the Philippine archipelago, Sibuyan would be right in the middle, almost like its heart. Ours.
It has an intact forest cover of around 75%, while most other islands would be very lucky to have 20%. It is one of the rare places where one can see uninterrupted forest, from the seaside mangroves to the mountain summit mossy forest. For its area, it has a uniquely high degree of endemism—mine mammals, seven lizards and two amphibians, and 112 vascular plants. That is as of last count. There is probably a lot more waiting to be discovered. One of the very first things that struck me about Sibuyan was the presence of beach forests. They are increasingly rare ecosystems that can usually be found only on inaccessible coasts and very remote islands. One can sense the difference even just with the roadside vegetation. The plants look different, maybe because one does not usually see an undisturbed lowland forest from up close. The other thing then that makes one fall for this island, which is more obvious, is the quality of its aquatic waters. I cannot think of another small island that has countless rivers and streams, gushing strainght to sea, unanimous in their clarity.
One such river is called Cantingas. It has a natural deep-water pool to which one can risk a swan dive. It also happens to be one of the cleanest rivers in the Philippines. Where else can you find living water to swim in and drink from, all at once?
President Arroyo, at various times in her political career. Has bathed there twice and was responsible for improvements around the pool. Lately though, in the tragically commonly case of misguided development, the municipality erected a concrete wall around one side of the pool bank, thereby completing what I consider to be an uglification project.
Notwithstanding this slight aesthetic disturbance, Cantingas remains important. It is the milieu for a seemingly simple conservation scheme that KKP initiated and that Armin and colleagues proudly set up. It is a watershed conservation plan. The water’s gatekeepers are the upland residents, a loose tribe of indigenous people who are called Sibuyan Mangyan Tagabukid. In return for their maintenance of the springs and headwaters (this involves cleaning, refraining from using pesticide to catch shrimp and fish, limiting and relocating their swidden plots), they get a restricted credit line with collaborating lowland merchants. The allowances shall be earmarked mostly for the upland children’s education costs. The funds shall be sourced from domestic usage and river resort fees.
This exemplary system won in a World Bank development contest and is so far, being replicated I various Asian countries.
Which is ironic, because it is suspended in Sibuyan as of now.
All because of nickel.
Sibuyan, unfortunately for it, also has subterranean riches. In Baranggay Espana,the exposed soil is ableed with oxides; the ground is all swirls and clumps of saturated reds and browns. It ismostly clay with a weathered soft rock layer beneath, called laterite. This is where nickel is supposed to be found. Since the advent of the new Mining Act, several companies have aggressively applied for small-scale extraction claims.
Small-scale mining sounds benign, it makes one imagine a gold panner biting a nugget or one of the seven dwarves with a hand tool, but in the legal sense it involves a right to extract minerals from areas up to 20 hectares in size, nor does it forbid the use of heavy earthmoving equipment. Thus, if one examined the issue of mining in Sibuyan one cannot but deduce that under the mechanics of small-scale mining, with several supposedly diverse operators, the actual destruction to be caused is clearly equal to a large-scale operation since all applications are contiguous with each other. All in all these applications cover several thousand hectares of forest. It would also have to include parts of the Cantingas watershed.
And that bugged the peace out of Armin Marin….
But he was most especially incensed when he saw the permit to cut trees, issued by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, under the then secretary, Angelo Reyes.
In one of the two approved mining permits, for the initial stage of operations, the building of its access road, ore stockpile and the first open pit, 69,000 trees were to be cut – translating to over 4 million board feet.
This is what deeply disturbed Armin Marin. He who could not even finish building his own house because e would never use illegally-felled wood, and who neither could afford commercial lumber.
More profoundly, it also would negate his years of effort at conservation in a single swat. His ingrained wisdom about the uniqueness of his island, the countless days he organized and educated his fellow Sibuyanons about the value of conserving nature, trying to shift their livelihood from indiscriminate resource use to ka more responsible mode, the personal sacrifices that he and his family had to take, were all mockingly being made futile.
But it was a disaster he though he could stop. While the livelihood development approach that he and the KKP tried to create as conservation measures all but fizzled and failed, the message of ecology apparently soaked in. Sibuyanons, over a majority, reject the very idea of mining on their island. Owners of titled land refused to be seduced by the millions that mining would supposedly earn them. Common folk are surprisingly aware of how mining would affect their farm plots and fishing grounds. Most Sibuyanons apparently seem to care for the next generation. Armin was not alone.
Ariel Bentayo and Lando Tan, former colleagues at the KKP are also staunch mining oppositionists on their own right. Together, they stood as a triad of leaders in the resistance to protect Sibuyan, particularly in their home municipality of San Fernando, from mining. Ariel Bentayo rejected an offer that was prospectively, to bring him P30 million pesos for mining to occur on his land which lay beside the claims. So did Armin and Lando.
The organized the rallies and the protests; they created a sustained vigilance among the folk, they educated their fellow Sibuyanons.
Protest movements, Sibuyan Island-style, were fun pluralistic frmily affairs. They resembled a minor fiesta more than anything else. The food was always potluck and guitars were strummed to songs of heartbreak instead of real protest while the grannies and babies giggled with incomplete sets of teeth.
On the fateful day of October 3, the crowd even had plans of shifting en masse to the nearby river later in the afternoon to bate and celebrate. They had camped out in front of the lodgings of the survey team that was supposed to undertake a requisite census of the forest that was going to be cut down. They had come to alternately beg and heckle the team to desist from doing the survey They also would bodily blockade vehicles that belonged to the mining corporations while waving their rejection placards with a mixture of frowns and laughter. Toddlers, students, teachers, pregnant women, barefoot farmers, farm laborers, balikbayans all joined in what was supposed to be a “lite” civic display of the desire to remain mining-free.
Armin had come that day to setup camp unusually early at about 5am. He was probably trying to organize the protest better as they had been surprised that the previous day, with no assemble in front of the survey team’s rented hut. He cooked rice on a pot and set up some tarps. He laid down the prepared placards and the local vine plates for the protesters. People slowly trickled in. At one point in the early part of morning, one member of the survey team bantered with them about how few they were.
By 9:30, the crowd had swelled to over a hundred people. An owner type jeep, with its two scooter-borne armed escorts, owned by the mining firm and driven by Mario Kingo had passed by two times. On its third pass the crowd decided to block it. Leah Ladica, the lone passenger and an officer of the firm, called Armin and asked about passage. Armin turns to the crowd and asks if they’ll allow it. The crowd roars in the negative. Armin tells the jeep that there is nothing he can do and that it would be better if they just turned back. The jeep reverses several meters away and pivots to turn…then Leah waves for Armin. Armin approaches the vehicles, which was then already some distance away.
People see him talking to its occupants, his hands on the roof.
And then a commotion ensues within the crowd. Jerald Sugoy, who came with the jeep’s entourage, started taking pictures of teachers and threatened to file cases against them for abandoning their classrooms. Voices were raised and most everyone goes to look.
The next thing they hear is the jeep revving. The next thing they see is Armin, half his body inside the jeep, his feet being dragged by the vehicle as it spurts to the opposite side of the road. A small ditch stops the jeep. A gunshot rings out. Armin Marin is shot in the mouth.
Mary Ann Marin, Armin’s youngest sister was one of the nearest and saw everything. She was on the way to buy rice noodles to add to the people’s snacks. She was one of the few whose attention wasn’t diverted by the disturbance within the crowd. She was the first person to cradle Armin. Ariel Bentayo, Armin’s best friend and sprinting from much farther, was next. They try to apply pressure on the exit wound.
Several men rush and disarm Mario Kingo. One of them manages to land a punch to his face. The armed escorts, the Cleope brothers, draw their guns. One of them tries to fire a shot at someone but it is swatted away to the air by his uncle who was part of the anti-mining crowd. They reclaim the gun and walk away. Leah Ladica ou of sheer fright, rips through a fence and tries to cross a rice field but gets stuck and loses her shoes. She manages tok hide inside a house.
While Armin adds red to the already red soil
How many more of its treasures must Sibuyan have to give up?
At present, it would not be an exaggeration to say Sibuyanons, close to unanimous, reject mining on their island. The only reason it remains a possibility is simply because of the machinations of a powerful few.
During the last local elections, no one ran on a platform for mining. Not a single one. Everyone claimed that he/she was “Anti-“ In San Fernando, the incumbent mayor lost, attributed largely to his allowing the first permit to push through. He claims that the permit he approved was for mere handpicking of exposed iron one privately-own, was to call for a local plebiscite in the concerned baranggay of Taclobo, whether they agreed to this mining operation which by then had modified its approach to using heavy machinery. This was an amendment that he felt had to go through the people. The nays won. He would leave with a clean conscience.
It is almost literally ironic though that, as it happened, one of the very first things that the new mayor and council did was to pass the application. This, despite the plebiscite results and after running on a strong anti-mining position.
The other permit, for nickel mining in Baranggay Espana, is equally, if not more, flawed. The first vote had 120 voting No, and 6 voting Yes. The second vote had over 200 voting No, while 4 voted Yes. To punctuate the trend and stamp all doubt, the third vote had everyone voting No. All these have been declared as failures for lack of quorum by the baranggay captain.
After Armin’s death, current secretary of the DENR, Lito Atienza, in a bold and wise move, belied his reputation as a tree butcher by canceling the permit issued by his predecessor. This effectively stops all mining applications over forestland.
Yet there is insecurity among the people, they want all mining to stop and all applications rejected. Permanently. Their fears are confirmed when several would-be operators still go through the requisite steps of an application, despite the impediment of not being to cut trees. The mining companies know something that they can only feel; Atienza’s order is but a temporary reprieve.
For environmentalists, mining is an easy whipping boy. Its less than average record in the Philippines is quite easy to broadcast and magnify. Apocalyptic landscapes are excellent marketing tools for the preachers of mining evil. Almost all exhausted mining sites have yet to show signs of recovery. Even the ubiquitous survivalist cogon grass fails to grow on some excavation sites, more than a decade after their abandonment.
Yet , one should not knock mining out of , hand. With the new Mining Act environmental protection and restoration, as well as local consultation are given primacy. Some disturbed lands would actually benefit from the reforestation requirement of the new law. There is a new dawn in this industry. The benevolent and responsible mining corporation is coming into being. Or should.
This was exactly Armin’s question, he who was not against mining per se. If they cannot follow and even manipulate the rules for survey and consultation, how can you trust them at all to perform the subsequent requirements of this otherwise wonderful new law?
As an urbanite consumer, it would be pretentious for me to criticize the mining industry. I, necessarily, use and enjoy their end products on a daily basis. It is thus, a very confusing endeavor, trying to decide and achieve that delicate balance between extraction and consumption, with the increasingly necessary corollary of coknservation.
But not, that is, in Sibuyan’s case.
I EXHORT EVERONE TO GO TO SIBUYAN AND SEE WHAT I MEAN. HIKE ITS TRAILS SMELL ITS FORESTS AND SWIM ITS RIVERS.
In Sibuyan’s case, it is pretty obvious why mining should not happen.
In Sibuyan’s case, the mining sites are to be on rare forestland filled with species found nowhere else on earth; forestland right below the steep slopes of Mt. Guiting-Guiting, forestland on clay soil that was difficult that is a watershed.
If a mature tree transpires about 700 liters of water a day, imagine, just for starters, what cutting 69,000 of them would bring you when it rains.
In Sibuyan’s case, it is an easy call. It is as clear as Cantingas. Nature’s nobility and soaring beauty is nowhere more apparent, nowhere more startlingly vibrant. I exhort everyone to go to Sibuyan and see what I mean. Hike its trails, smell its forests and swim its rivers.
Do these, and I can almost guarantee that you shall be among us who will fight to protect this nobility from being excavated into shame.
BY IVAN SARENAS
Up until about 10:00 am of October 3, 2007, Armin Marin was a living saint.
He was a freshly elected municipal councilor who was sponsoring decidedly environmental bills.
He was President of the Parish Pastoral Counsil.
He was building the roof of the church.
He was building classrooms.
He was an NGO worker in the extreme sense. In a land claim survey for Sibuyan”s indigenous people, he extended their coverage well into land his family owned.
He was an amateur, under-qualified philanthropist. Following his father”s business model, he would finance someones”s pig breeding venture but would not take a piglet as payback. The piglet would go to another beneficiary. Most of his salary would go to loans for the more needy. He organized donation drives for the provision of school desks.
He was a tickler of children.
He was a smiler.
He was a lover of trees.
But he always wasn’t so. He grew up on an island extraordinarily abundant with forest resources. As most everyone in the island, his family was engaged in the “lumber” business. Being the eldest of 10, he became the de facto assistant to his father.
Notwithstanding this occupation, the Marin family was a case study on the positive powers of education. From wood money, all the ten siblings managed to get tertiary education. Education that made them somewhat sensitive to the real costs of their empowerment. When logging became problematic, it was necessary and easy for them to give up.
For a period, Armin floated between jobs. A boat operator for a fishing cooperative some of the time, a paramilitary soldier the next, until Kabang Kalikasan ng Pilipinas came along (this is the NGO known worldwide as the World Wide Fund for Nature, WWF) giving Armin his first stable fob. Happy to finally get a regular paycheck, he also got more than he bargained for – a deeper kind of education. Consequently, he acquired a worldview and an idea of his place in the family of things.
With the zeal of a man with a mission, he ran for councilor…but lost, allegedly because of credibility problems. Who would listen to a former logger preaching conservation?
Yet he soldiered on, doing deeds consistent with his new viewpoint. Like most of the local staff, he had become more than an employee. He was galvanized into one of the most passionate advocates for conservation. The transformation was complete. It became a lifelong adherence, as he continued his efforts even when the NGO had to terminate the project for lack of funding.
Sibuyan, as Armin came to realize, is extremely special.
If you looked at the map of the Philippine archipelago, Sibuyan would be right in the middle, almost like its heart. Ours.
It has an intact forest cover of around 75%, while most other islands would be very lucky to have 20%. It is one of the rare places where one can see uninterrupted forest, from the seaside mangroves to the mountain summit mossy forest. For its area, it has a uniquely high degree of endemism—mine mammals, seven lizards and two amphibians, and 112 vascular plants. That is as of last count. There is probably a lot more waiting to be discovered. One of the very first things that struck me about Sibuyan was the presence of beach forests. They are increasingly rare ecosystems that can usually be found only on inaccessible coasts and very remote islands. One can sense the difference even just with the roadside vegetation. The plants look different, maybe because one does not usually see an undisturbed lowland forest from up close. The other thing then that makes one fall for this island, which is more obvious, is the quality of its aquatic waters. I cannot think of another small island that has countless rivers and streams, gushing strainght to sea, unanimous in their clarity.
One such river is called Cantingas. It has a natural deep-water pool to which one can risk a swan dive. It also happens to be one of the cleanest rivers in the Philippines. Where else can you find living water to swim in and drink from, all at once?
President Arroyo, at various times in her political career. Has bathed there twice and was responsible for improvements around the pool. Lately though, in the tragically commonly case of misguided development, the municipality erected a concrete wall around one side of the pool bank, thereby completing what I consider to be an uglification project.
Notwithstanding this slight aesthetic disturbance, Cantingas remains important. It is the milieu for a seemingly simple conservation scheme that KKP initiated and that Armin and colleagues proudly set up. It is a watershed conservation plan. The water’s gatekeepers are the upland residents, a loose tribe of indigenous people who are called Sibuyan Mangyan Tagabukid. In return for their maintenance of the springs and headwaters (this involves cleaning, refraining from using pesticide to catch shrimp and fish, limiting and relocating their swidden plots), they get a restricted credit line with collaborating lowland merchants. The allowances shall be earmarked mostly for the upland children’s education costs. The funds shall be sourced from domestic usage and river resort fees.
This exemplary system won in a World Bank development contest and is so far, being replicated I various Asian countries.
Which is ironic, because it is suspended in Sibuyan as of now.
All because of nickel.
Sibuyan, unfortunately for it, also has subterranean riches. In Baranggay Espana,the exposed soil is ableed with oxides; the ground is all swirls and clumps of saturated reds and browns. It ismostly clay with a weathered soft rock layer beneath, called laterite. This is where nickel is supposed to be found. Since the advent of the new Mining Act, several companies have aggressively applied for small-scale extraction claims.
Small-scale mining sounds benign, it makes one imagine a gold panner biting a nugget or one of the seven dwarves with a hand tool, but in the legal sense it involves a right to extract minerals from areas up to 20 hectares in size, nor does it forbid the use of heavy earthmoving equipment. Thus, if one examined the issue of mining in Sibuyan one cannot but deduce that under the mechanics of small-scale mining, with several supposedly diverse operators, the actual destruction to be caused is clearly equal to a large-scale operation since all applications are contiguous with each other. All in all these applications cover several thousand hectares of forest. It would also have to include parts of the Cantingas watershed.
And that bugged the peace out of Armin Marin….
But he was most especially incensed when he saw the permit to cut trees, issued by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, under the then secretary, Angelo Reyes.
In one of the two approved mining permits, for the initial stage of operations, the building of its access road, ore stockpile and the first open pit, 69,000 trees were to be cut – translating to over 4 million board feet.
This is what deeply disturbed Armin Marin. He who could not even finish building his own house because e would never use illegally-felled wood, and who neither could afford commercial lumber.
More profoundly, it also would negate his years of effort at conservation in a single swat. His ingrained wisdom about the uniqueness of his island, the countless days he organized and educated his fellow Sibuyanons about the value of conserving nature, trying to shift their livelihood from indiscriminate resource use to ka more responsible mode, the personal sacrifices that he and his family had to take, were all mockingly being made futile.
But it was a disaster he though he could stop. While the livelihood development approach that he and the KKP tried to create as conservation measures all but fizzled and failed, the message of ecology apparently soaked in. Sibuyanons, over a majority, reject the very idea of mining on their island. Owners of titled land refused to be seduced by the millions that mining would supposedly earn them. Common folk are surprisingly aware of how mining would affect their farm plots and fishing grounds. Most Sibuyanons apparently seem to care for the next generation. Armin was not alone.
Ariel Bentayo and Lando Tan, former colleagues at the KKP are also staunch mining oppositionists on their own right. Together, they stood as a triad of leaders in the resistance to protect Sibuyan, particularly in their home municipality of San Fernando, from mining. Ariel Bentayo rejected an offer that was prospectively, to bring him P30 million pesos for mining to occur on his land which lay beside the claims. So did Armin and Lando.
The organized the rallies and the protests; they created a sustained vigilance among the folk, they educated their fellow Sibuyanons.
Protest movements, Sibuyan Island-style, were fun pluralistic frmily affairs. They resembled a minor fiesta more than anything else. The food was always potluck and guitars were strummed to songs of heartbreak instead of real protest while the grannies and babies giggled with incomplete sets of teeth.
On the fateful day of October 3, the crowd even had plans of shifting en masse to the nearby river later in the afternoon to bate and celebrate. They had camped out in front of the lodgings of the survey team that was supposed to undertake a requisite census of the forest that was going to be cut down. They had come to alternately beg and heckle the team to desist from doing the survey They also would bodily blockade vehicles that belonged to the mining corporations while waving their rejection placards with a mixture of frowns and laughter. Toddlers, students, teachers, pregnant women, barefoot farmers, farm laborers, balikbayans all joined in what was supposed to be a “lite” civic display of the desire to remain mining-free.
Armin had come that day to setup camp unusually early at about 5am. He was probably trying to organize the protest better as they had been surprised that the previous day, with no assemble in front of the survey team’s rented hut. He cooked rice on a pot and set up some tarps. He laid down the prepared placards and the local vine plates for the protesters. People slowly trickled in. At one point in the early part of morning, one member of the survey team bantered with them about how few they were.
By 9:30, the crowd had swelled to over a hundred people. An owner type jeep, with its two scooter-borne armed escorts, owned by the mining firm and driven by Mario Kingo had passed by two times. On its third pass the crowd decided to block it. Leah Ladica, the lone passenger and an officer of the firm, called Armin and asked about passage. Armin turns to the crowd and asks if they’ll allow it. The crowd roars in the negative. Armin tells the jeep that there is nothing he can do and that it would be better if they just turned back. The jeep reverses several meters away and pivots to turn…then Leah waves for Armin. Armin approaches the vehicles, which was then already some distance away.
People see him talking to its occupants, his hands on the roof.
And then a commotion ensues within the crowd. Jerald Sugoy, who came with the jeep’s entourage, started taking pictures of teachers and threatened to file cases against them for abandoning their classrooms. Voices were raised and most everyone goes to look.
The next thing they hear is the jeep revving. The next thing they see is Armin, half his body inside the jeep, his feet being dragged by the vehicle as it spurts to the opposite side of the road. A small ditch stops the jeep. A gunshot rings out. Armin Marin is shot in the mouth.
Mary Ann Marin, Armin’s youngest sister was one of the nearest and saw everything. She was on the way to buy rice noodles to add to the people’s snacks. She was one of the few whose attention wasn’t diverted by the disturbance within the crowd. She was the first person to cradle Armin. Ariel Bentayo, Armin’s best friend and sprinting from much farther, was next. They try to apply pressure on the exit wound.
Several men rush and disarm Mario Kingo. One of them manages to land a punch to his face. The armed escorts, the Cleope brothers, draw their guns. One of them tries to fire a shot at someone but it is swatted away to the air by his uncle who was part of the anti-mining crowd. They reclaim the gun and walk away. Leah Ladica ou of sheer fright, rips through a fence and tries to cross a rice field but gets stuck and loses her shoes. She manages tok hide inside a house.
While Armin adds red to the already red soil
How many more of its treasures must Sibuyan have to give up?
At present, it would not be an exaggeration to say Sibuyanons, close to unanimous, reject mining on their island. The only reason it remains a possibility is simply because of the machinations of a powerful few.
During the last local elections, no one ran on a platform for mining. Not a single one. Everyone claimed that he/she was “Anti-“ In San Fernando, the incumbent mayor lost, attributed largely to his allowing the first permit to push through. He claims that the permit he approved was for mere handpicking of exposed iron one privately-own, was to call for a local plebiscite in the concerned baranggay of Taclobo, whether they agreed to this mining operation which by then had modified its approach to using heavy machinery. This was an amendment that he felt had to go through the people. The nays won. He would leave with a clean conscience.
It is almost literally ironic though that, as it happened, one of the very first things that the new mayor and council did was to pass the application. This, despite the plebiscite results and after running on a strong anti-mining position.
The other permit, for nickel mining in Baranggay Espana, is equally, if not more, flawed. The first vote had 120 voting No, and 6 voting Yes. The second vote had over 200 voting No, while 4 voted Yes. To punctuate the trend and stamp all doubt, the third vote had everyone voting No. All these have been declared as failures for lack of quorum by the baranggay captain.
After Armin’s death, current secretary of the DENR, Lito Atienza, in a bold and wise move, belied his reputation as a tree butcher by canceling the permit issued by his predecessor. This effectively stops all mining applications over forestland.
Yet there is insecurity among the people, they want all mining to stop and all applications rejected. Permanently. Their fears are confirmed when several would-be operators still go through the requisite steps of an application, despite the impediment of not being to cut trees. The mining companies know something that they can only feel; Atienza’s order is but a temporary reprieve.
For environmentalists, mining is an easy whipping boy. Its less than average record in the Philippines is quite easy to broadcast and magnify. Apocalyptic landscapes are excellent marketing tools for the preachers of mining evil. Almost all exhausted mining sites have yet to show signs of recovery. Even the ubiquitous survivalist cogon grass fails to grow on some excavation sites, more than a decade after their abandonment.
Yet , one should not knock mining out of , hand. With the new Mining Act environmental protection and restoration, as well as local consultation are given primacy. Some disturbed lands would actually benefit from the reforestation requirement of the new law. There is a new dawn in this industry. The benevolent and responsible mining corporation is coming into being. Or should.
This was exactly Armin’s question, he who was not against mining per se. If they cannot follow and even manipulate the rules for survey and consultation, how can you trust them at all to perform the subsequent requirements of this otherwise wonderful new law?
As an urbanite consumer, it would be pretentious for me to criticize the mining industry. I, necessarily, use and enjoy their end products on a daily basis. It is thus, a very confusing endeavor, trying to decide and achieve that delicate balance between extraction and consumption, with the increasingly necessary corollary of coknservation.
But not, that is, in Sibuyan’s case.
I EXHORT EVERONE TO GO TO SIBUYAN AND SEE WHAT I MEAN. HIKE ITS TRAILS SMELL ITS FORESTS AND SWIM ITS RIVERS.
In Sibuyan’s case, it is pretty obvious why mining should not happen.
In Sibuyan’s case, the mining sites are to be on rare forestland filled with species found nowhere else on earth; forestland right below the steep slopes of Mt. Guiting-Guiting, forestland on clay soil that was difficult that is a watershed.
If a mature tree transpires about 700 liters of water a day, imagine, just for starters, what cutting 69,000 of them would bring you when it rains.
In Sibuyan’s case, it is an easy call. It is as clear as Cantingas. Nature’s nobility and soaring beauty is nowhere more apparent, nowhere more startlingly vibrant. I exhort everyone to go to Sibuyan and see what I mean. Hike its trails, smell its forests and swim its rivers.
Do these, and I can almost guarantee that you shall be among us who will fight to protect this nobility from being excavated into shame.