PMPI Press Release on the Marinduqueño NGO petitions against new Marcopper application, wants province to be mine-free

Boac, Marinduque/Quezon City, Metro Manila – A local non-government organization in Marinduque has forwarded resolutions and statements to the Regional Office of the National Economic Development Authority for MIMAROPA, including an appeal from Former Associate of the Supreme Court and now Marinduque Governor Presbitero Velasco, Jr. to President Rodrigo Duterte to deny all mining applications Marinduque.
 
Marinduque Council for Environmental Concerns, Inc. Or MACEC an NGO based in Boac, Marinduque has been assisting plaintiffs win a case filed against Barrick Gold, Marcopper Mining Corp., and Placer Dome, Inc.
 
Marcopper/Placer Dome is based in Canada and one of the world’s biggest, was involved in the 1996 toxic spillage when the drainage tunnels of its open-pit mines broke causing about 2 to 3 million tons toxic mine tailings.  
 
In the document submitted to the office of OIC NEDA Director Augustin Mendoza, the group states, “Forty-One (41) resolutions and statements from the Provincial Government of Marinduque, LGUs, BLGUs, Academe and Civil Society Organizations requesting to deny with finality the MPSA application of Marcopper and 38 other mining applications, to delist the Province of Marinduque in the mining tenement area and to declare the province of Marinduque a Mining-free Zone in response to the lifting of mining moratorium thru EO 130 issued by Malacañang.”
 
Yoly Esguerra, National Coordinator Church-based NGO Partnership Mission for People’s Initiatives (formerly Philippine Misereor Partnership, Inc.) said, “The petition filed by the people of the Province of Marinduque contained an overwhelming evidence and reasons against allowing corporations to mine the island.
 
“We urge the DENR to heed the voice of the people. It will be a shame for the DENR, if another mining contract is permitted given the volume of resolutions and statements from the different communities and the LGUs of the Province of Marinduque. This clearly manifests the will of the people of Marinduque”, Ms. Esguerra added.
 
Likewise, PMPI believes that Marinduque Province being a small island ecosystem should be declared as a Mine-free Zone. Executive Order 79 signed by then President Aquino states that small island ecosystem should be exempted from mining activities. Moreover, Boac in Marinduque is home to Marinduque Wildlife Sanctuary – a protected area under the Expanded National Integrated Protected Area Systems and Proclamation No. 696 Series of 2004.
 
Call to Revoke EO 130

Beth Manggol, Executive Secretary of MACEC said “We are worried that the newly approved Executive Order 130, lifting the moratorium on new mining application will pave the way for new applications all over the country but also in our own island. We do not want a repeat of the tragedy caused by Marcopper to our people. We know better. We have learned the hard lessons of environmental destruction and danger to health caused by Marcopper Mining activities in the island.”
 
PMPI in a statement, calls on the Office of the President to revoke its recently issued Executive Order 130 together with their partners communities in Zamboanga City, Manicani Island and Homonhon Island in Eastern Samar, and Palina, Kibungan, Benguet. Celebrating the World Environment Day last June 5, a social media call to revoke the EO 130 and to stop mining in their respective communities were echoed by the communities as they also held a watershed and coastal shores clean-up and tree planting activities to highlight efforts at protecting the environment.
 
While the government cited that mining operations will spur new jobs and revenue for the country and consequently economic recovery from the negative impact of COVID as among the reason for lifting the moratorium to new mining application, PMPI said that the Office of the President does not have the evidence to back up this claim. It reiterates that based on the Mines and Geosciences Bureau and the Bureau of Internal Revenue from mining from 2013-2018 in the Philippines has only generated below 1% of the country’s total employment and below 1.5% of the total revenues through taxes collected by the government.  
 
That mining generates jobs and revenue remains a myth until now, given that mining corporations in the Philippines are basically exporters of mineral ores, primarily to China and Japan first and foremost. They extract and bring out the ores and even our soil out of the country. There is no full-blown mining industry to speak of in the Philippines except in the extraction phase, and small processing plants where even the revenue taxes they pay is below than what they should have been and is being contested in court.  Other than these mining activities, nothing from mining industry in the Philippines can be distinguishable as revenue making.