Category Archive for: gobyerno

komentaryo

Oceana Gold: history, abuse, mining

If I owned a mining company in the Philippines, and my mine was declared closed or suspended by the new leadership of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), I would fight back.

I would fight back with transparency. After all, I demand it of the DENR audit; I should be able to expect it of my own mine. I would release all information on the operations of the mine, and I would allow the community, scientists and academics, media, government officials, to enter my mines, study my operations, and look at the environment that surrounds it. I would answer questions that have been asked all these years. I would be thankful for those years when the DENR didn’t care enough, and accept that regulation is now the name of the game. I would up and leave.

I wouldn’t operate like it’s business as usual, while the suspension is in place. That would be foolish, when the nation’s eyes are on the mining sector.

But then again, I’m not Oceana Gold which, despite years of protests, countless studies and reports, and now a suspension order, continues to operate (Bulatlat.com, 3 March) like it hasn’t done anything wrong at all. (more…)

komentaryo

STRIKE!

The Department of Transportation (DOTr) and the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) have been busy doing some spinning. They keep insisting – complete with infographics – that the jeepney phaseout is actually a modernization plan that will make these public transport vehicles safer for the public and kinder to the environment. After Monday’s transport strike, they’ve insisted that it wasn’t nationwide at all, belittling its effect on the commuting public, towards asserting that the strike was no problem at all.

Which behooves the question: if it was no problem at all, why is the LTFRB even threatening suspension of jeepney franchises that joined in the strike?

Sometimes the magnitude of the protest is measured by the kind of reaction it generates from government agencies and the powers-that-be. And in the case of the Monday strike vis a vis the damage control and spin that LTFRB and DOTr are doing, it’s pretty clear it was far larger than they will care to admit. (more…)

komentaryo

Andanar imagines destabilization, drowns in own false claims

We all know Communications Secretary Martin Andanar is not doing his job. He has no idea what his job entails, what it requires of him, and so he cannot even begin to meet its demands.

It was as such no surprise that in the face of claims by former police officer Arthur Lascañas about the role of then Mayor Rodrigo Duterte in the Davao Death Squad (DDS) and the spate of killings it was responsible for, Secretary Andanar decided to launch an all-out offensive on the basis of what he says is a “demolition job” and “destabilization plot” against the President, neither of which he has proof of.

His strategy? A series of false claims.

Then we watched as he unraveled in a little over 24 hours. (more…)

komentaryo

The party’s over

On Valentine’s Day, Secretary Gina Lopez of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) announced that her department was cancelling 75 MPSAs or Mineral Production Sharing Agreements with mining companies. Many of these projects are only in the exploration stage. The cancellation of MPSAs will not mean the loss of jobs.

But of course the mining companies, the Chamber of Mines of the Philippines (COMP), and pro-mining advocates will not take this sitting down. (more…)

komentaryo

Zambales mines: A history of questionable practices

Between the pro-mining students protesting at the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) officials, and the insistence that we talk only about the jobs to be lost and the stock market crash, it is clear that we are being distracted from the more important questions about whether or not the mining projects the DENR has ordered closed have in fact been bad for the environment and our communities.

For some of these mines, there is already enough proof and data, enough studies through the years, enough protests, that prove how these have adversely affected the environment and the communities that are in close proximity to the mines.

Case in point: Zambales. (more…)