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Stop Illegal Mining Antonio M. Reyes

By Antonio M. Reyes

The land and sea mining in Pinutan, San Ricardo should be stopped because they are illegal and destroying the town’s hills and the marine life along its municipal waters. We have six government offices in Southern Leyte who are supposed to conserve and protect our environment and natural resources but none of them are doing any thing about this criminal activity.

The entities I am referring to are the local government of San Ricardo, the Comunity Environment and Natural Resources Office, the Provincial Environment and Natural Resources Management Office, the Provincial Mining Regulatory Board, the Provincial Disaster Management Office and the Provincial Committee on Environment and Natural Resources.

This inaction is inexplicable since anyone who passes San Ricardo cannot help but see the mayhem these mining operations are causing. Its particularly appalling because Barangay Pinutan was the site of the mega landslide in 2004 that practically buried the village and killed dozens of its residents. Many people there believe the high grade ore containing gold dusts came from the hills that had cascaded down on the village and the nearby seashore.

The nonchalant attitude to this latest assault on our environment is adding substance to the growing belief of concerned citizens who are beginning to think that our government is not only useless, but harmful to the people they are supposed to be serving.

For no less than the Director of the Provincial Environment and Natural Resources Management Office (PENRMO) Pedro Sorio Jr. has admitted to the Southern Leyte Times that they were aware of the mining in San Ricardo, but did not stop it because it provided a livelihood for the less fortunate people there.

If this is the attitude of our highest provincial official concerned with the environment, we have a lot to be worried about, because the CENRO chief here has been using the same argument for allowing small time illegal loggers to cut down the trees that our hard working Congressman has been planting since the late 1980s.

The honorable members of the Provincial Board should immediately pass a resolution authorizing Governor Damian Mercado to stop the land and sea mining in Pinutan, San Ricard, because they have no permit to operate and are killing the fish that the marginal fishermen there depend on for their survival.

Another matter they should look into is the request of the Bridgestone Mining Company for off shore mining exploration permits covering the towns of Silago, Hinunangan and Hinundayan.