Category Archive for: komentaryo

komentaryo

Losing Leni

I have no love lost for Vice President Leni Robredo, but I would rather she was VP than Bongbong Marcos.

Having said that, one wishes she knew what she was doing. That she would have the sense to have a real communications team, one that will have her back and will not allow her to make a fool of herself. One that will tell her to step back, take stock, and regroup. A trusted group of people who will remind her that as Vice President she does have limitations, even as she might insist on her freedoms, and who will teach her how to push forward and how to retreat.

If there’s anything VP Leni and President Duterte have in common, it is this: both of them do not have people who are in control of their communications. Neither of them have people who ensure that they will be protected even from their own pronouncements. Neither of them have communications teams that already see the damage before it’s even done. (more…)

komentaryo

The embarrassment of mines, the fortitude of Gina Lopez

If there’s anything that’s been absolutely fascinating watching the proceedings for the confirmation of Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) Secretary Gina Lopez at the Commission on Appointments, it’s how that long list of oppositors have come together solely to discredit her by misinforming the public and evading culpability for the mining crisis.

Mining misinformation
Mining companies and their advocates and employees want us to forget things. For two days last week, we watched miners and mining interests falling all over themselves trying to make us forget irresponsible mining’s destruction of the environment, displacement of communities, and militarization of sitios and barangays.

So instead of talking about that, the Chamber of Mines of the Philippines (COMP) insists that Lopez is “someone who does not believe in the Constitution’s mandate for the State to undertake the exploration, development, and utilization of natural resources, and as such, has put us, government’s partners in mineral development, at a quandary” (Feb 9 Statement). (more…)

komentaryo

Unwell, unjust: #NoToDeathPenalty

Here’s the thing with the death penalty bill as passed by the House of Representatives on Tuesday. It’s so ill-timed, it disallowed debate and discussion, it refused any amendments – unless it’s agreed upon during the majority caucuses – and ultimately it revealed how a majority of our Congress representatives do not represent the people who voted them into power.

Instead they have agreed, as per this death penalty bill, that if any of their constituents are so much as caught with drugs, from cocaine to marijuana, that they must be sentenced to death.

Yes, death for mere possession. You will be killed by the State for possession. It is equal to what a drug lord, dealer, or manufacturer will get under this death penalty law.

Though of course given the current state of affairs, when purported drug suspects are being killed on our streets daily – eight on Tuesday, on the first day of Tokhang 2 – so many might just shrug their shoulders and think: oh well. (more…)

komentaryo

Mines are ours

It is difficult to stay calm when you’re watching the Commission on Appointments proceedings for the confirmation of Gina Lopez as Environment Secretary. It doesn’t help that at the center of it all, the Chairman of the Committee for the Environment is Manny Pacquiao who, without a script, reveals himself as utterly incompetent and totally lost — he can’t even keep up with the concept itself of what the DENR does, the laws that it protects and moves within, the fact that these mines were are talking about actually have a history of violence against the community and of environmental degradation.

Ah, but Pacquiao has the Bible, from which he quotes: “For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land <…> a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.”

So therefore daw, mining is okay.  (more…)

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…)