Mining firm says it hasn’t started digging

First posted 00:36am (Mla time) Aug 08, 2006
By Jofelle TesorioInquirer
http://specials.inq7.net/theenvironmentreport/index.php?ver=1&index=1&story_id=13996

Editor's Note: Published on Page A14 of the August 8, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer

PUERTO PRINCESA CITY—MacroAsia Mining Co. has denied it has started operations even without an environmental compliance certificate in its more than 1,000 hectares of concession in Brooke’s Point, Palawan, as alleged by antimining groups.

Lawyer Marivic Moya, MacroAsia spokesperson, told the provincial council, that questioned the firm’s Mineral Production Sharing Agreement (MPSA), it had not brought a single shovel to the site as it did not know yet what to extract from the operations.

Despite this, the company has granted scholarships to students from indigenous communities in five barangays in the area. It was about to begin a medical program but decided to suspend it because of the charges raised, she added.

Another mining project, in Narra town, got positive reception from local officials.
The town’s mayor, Lucena Dimaala, in a statement said the mining project of Platinum Group Metals Corp. (PGMC) was able to provide job opportunities in the past two years and helped lower the unemployment rate in Narra and its nearby barangays.

She said 75 percent of the residents of Narra were gainfully employed at PGMC.
“The firm did its best to help the local government unit address the unemployment problem here,” she said in the statement.

She said PGMC is also committed to provide scholarship grants to poor but deserving students in the high school and collegiate levels.

She said indigenous peoples from Narra received 1 percent of their share of P2,384,500 derived from the nickel mining operation last year, while PGMC is set to turn over another P2.1 million this year.

The provincial government earlier expressed surprise at the Department of Environment and Natural Resources’ grant to MacroAsia of an MPSA for large-scale mining in about 1,130 hectares of land in Brooke’s Point.

Gov. Joel Reyes sent a letter to Environment Secretary Angelo Reyes on May 10 seeking the suspension or cancellation of MacroAsia’s MPSA because it had failed to comply with the province’s standard process for mining applications.

Reyes said MacroAsia bypassed the provincial government when it obtained its MPSA as all he could remember was the company’s application for an exploration permit.