SEVERAL nongovernmental organizations and residents of Zamboanga Peninsula on Wednesday filed a petition before the Supreme Court (SC) seeking the issuance of a writ of kalikasan against mining operations in the area.
In a 33-page petition, the petitioners Philippine Earth Justice Center Inc., Alliance to Save the Integrity of Nature Inc., Kesalubuukan Tupusumi Organization of Subanen People and several other individuals also sought the issuance of a temporary environmental protection order (Tepo) to enjoin respondents Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) from processing, granting and issuing new mining permits in all parts of the country, particularly in Zamboanga Peninsula until environmental concerns they raised have been fully addressed.
Aside from the DENR and MGB, the petitioners also named the Protected Areas and Wildlife Management Bureau, the National Commission for Indigenous Peoples and mining companies operating in the Zamboanga peninsula.
A writ of kalikasan is a legal remedy designed for the protection of one’s constitutional right to a healthy environment.
The petitioners noted that based on the 2008 data from the MGB, the total land area subject to and opened for mining in Zamboanga Peninsula was 703,595.33 hectares, accounting for 45.25 percent of its total land area.
However, as of March 2011, 170 mining tenements were already approved involving a total of 808,269.09 hectares, which is about 51 percent of the peninsula’s land mass, thus “the threat to the environment has become very real rather than merely apparent.”
The Zamboanga peninsula is composed of the provinces of Zamboanga del Norte, Zamboanga del Sur and Zamboanga Sibugay. It includes the cities of Dipolog and Dapitan of Zamboanga del Norte and Pagadian City of Zamboanga del Sur.
“By allowing mineral extraction in almost all the upland areas of the Zamboanga peninsula, respondents have callously impaired or threatened to impair petitioners’ right to ecology. Because of their wholesale mining grants, mountaintops will definitely be ultimately scraped or bored hollow, valleys will be filled with quarried earth and raised, rivers and creeks that supply water into downhill communities for their domestic, agricultural and industrial uses will be polluted or will run dry,” the petitioners said.
The petitioners stressed that under Section 16 of Article II of the 1987 Philippine Constitution, the government is obliged to “protect and advance the people’s right to a balanced ecology in rhythm and harmony of nature.”
They further argued that the indiscriminate issuance of mining permits covering 51 percent of Zamboanga Peninsula violates Section 19 of Republic Act (RA) 7942, or the Philippine Mining Act of 1995.
The provision prohibits mining operations in “old growth or virgin forests, proclaimed watershed forest reserves, wilderness areas, mangrove forests, mossy forests, national parks, provincial/municipal forests, parks, greenbelts, game refuge and bird sanctuaries….”
The petitioners noted that the MGB wrongly presumed that the entire mountainous area of the peninsula is denuded and without watersheds when it opened almost all of the mountain areas in the peninsula for mineral extraction.
The petitioners cited MGB’s abuse of discretion when it issued a mining permit to Geotechniques and Mines Inc. (Hami) on Aug. 5, 2009, covering an area of 567 hectares inside the mountain ranges of three barangays in Midsalip, namely Sigapod, Guinabot and Cumaron.
