ENVIRONMENT Secretary Roy A. Cimatu has issued a stern warning against quarry operators reportedly encroaching on conservation areas in the province of Rizal.
He said erring quarry companies may face closure and their permits revoked should they continue to threaten protected areas covered by environmental laws.
On Tuesday, Cimatu had to skip the World Wildlife Day celebration at the Ninoy Aquino Parks and Wildlife Center to conduct a site inspection in the Masungi Georeserve in the town of Baras, which is being threatened by a quarry firm.
Verifying reports that a quarry company had started to put up barb wires to fence off a 500-hectare portion of the ecotourism and conservation site, Cimatu vowed to conduct a thorough investigation.
“Aside from closure, we will summon and give them notice of violation with what they did here,”Cimatu said in a statement.
The DENR chief was responding to an appeal made by the management of Masungi Georeserve against Rapid City Realty and Development Corp. who had allegedly employed heavily armed members of the Special Action Force (SAF) to harass their volunteers.
Rapid City Realty and Development Corp has an existing Mineral Production Sharing Agreement (MPSA) granted by the DENR in 1998. It is now being looked into by the Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) on Cimatu’s instructions.
Learning of the abuses committed by quarry companies in Rizal, Cimatu had instructed the MGB to scrutinize the MPSAs of two other quarrying firms— Quarry Rock Group Inc., and Quimson Limestone Inc.—which along with Rapid City are operating within the Upper Marikina River Basin Protected Landscape using the MPSAs they secured in the late 1990s.
DENR Undersecretary Benny Antiporda, who accompanied Cimatu during the inspection, said the DENR chief led the dismantling and seizure of the barbed wires that were hammered into several Tibig trees in the area.
“Secretary Cimatu has already ordered [issuance of a] notice of violation to Rapid City and wants all quarry companies there to undergo investigation. If there’s a violation, he is really going to cancel their MPSAs. He got mad upon seeing the barb wires nailed to those trees when we went there to investigate, especially because the area is a Protected Area,” Antiporda told the BusinessMirror.
The notice of violation, he said, signals the start of “due process,” adding that “as much as possible, he wants the MPSA canceled,” he said.
In a statement, Cimatu expressed exasperation that quarry companies continue to threaten important watersheds.
“This is a watershed, and also a protected area,” Cimatu pointed out. “We have already identified this as a protected area and these mining companies are within the protected area.”
Some mining companies, including quarry companies, however, have prior mining rights over vast tracts of land prior to the enactment of the Republic Act 7586 of 1992 or the National Integrated Protected Areas System (Nipas) Act or even prior to the declaration of some areas that are rich in biodiversity as a national park or critical habitat which makes them off-limits to destructive development activities.
Mining companies and conservation advocates have been clashing over legal issues hounding the Nipas Act and Republic Act 7942 or the Philippine Mining Act of 1995, as some MPSAs overlap or are even wholly within a declared Protected Area.
An MPSA usually granted to a mining or a quarry company has a validity of 25 years from the year it was granted.
Since Rapid City’s MPSA will soon expire and is subject for renewal, Cimatu assumed that the fencing off was intended for the expansion of its property.
“The company’s MPSA is due for renewal, that’s why it is expanding. I’m sure it would seek [an] extension of the MPSA, but I will not allow any more extensions here,” Cimatu pointed out.
He added: “In fact, I’m even considering a closure of this MPSA. There is no such thing [as allowing] a mining company—either metallic or non-metallic—to have mining operations in this area.”
Meanwhile, Cimatu directed Rizal Provincial Environment and Natural Resources Officer (Penro) Isidro Mercado to expedite the establishment of a satellite office in Masungi Geopark to strengthen the protection of the nature park and surrounding protected areas.
Image credits: Contributed Photo