Brazen lies
The Chamber of Mines of the Philippines (COMP) and the OceanaGold deliberately misled the public when they claimed in the media that there are no mines in the 10 poorest provinces in the country. In the wake of Environment Secretary Regina Paz L. Lopez’s statement sometime middle of last year that mining causes poverty, COMP Executive Vice President Nelia Halcon issued a press release containing the lie. Last month Chito Gozar, senior vice president for communications and external affairs of OceanaGold, repeated the falsehood (“Mines absent in 10 poorest provinces,” March 7).