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The Court of Appeals has sustained its previous order
affirming the decision of the Department of Environment and Natural
Resources (DENR) to cancel a local firm’s small-scale mining
permit for violating mining laws and regulations, and environmental
laws.
As this developed, the Catholic
Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) maintained its
opposition towards large-scale mining operations in the country.
In a four-page resolution, the
appellate court’s Special Fifth Division dismissed with finality
the petition of the Platinum Group Metals Corp. questioning the
DENR‘s cancellation of the company’s “operating agreement”
with Olympic Mines and Development Corp., its mining permit, as well
as its environmental compliance certificate for violation of
environmental laws.
“More importantly, we dismissed
the petition because petitioner failed to first appeal the
resolution of October 30, 2006 of the panel of arbitrators to the
DENR Mines Adjudication Board thereby breaching the doctrine of
exhaustion of administrative remedies,” the appellate court said.
The resolution was penned by
Associate Justice Edgardo F. Sundiam and concurred by Associate
Justices Mario L. Guarina 3rd and Monina Arevalo-Zenarosa.
On January 18, 2007, the
appellate court dismissed outright Platinum’s petition for
certiorari due to the company’s failure to pursue its motion for
reconsideration before the panel of arbitrators.
The case stemmed from disputed
rights to mining areas located in the municipalities of Narra and
Española in Palawan, known as the Toronto Nickel Mine consisting of
708 hectares, and the Pulot Nickel Mine with an area of 2,176
hectares in the name of Olympic Mines.
CBCP Episcopal Commission on
Indigenous Peoples head and Laoag Bishop Sergio Utleg said Wedensday
he is not optimistic that the promised benefits from large-scale
mining would be realized sooner in the countryside.
“Facts prove it where mining
occurs, there exists poverty,” Utleg said. “Most mining
companies are foreign-owned and they came to the Philippines
basically for profit and not for the benefit of the immediate
community.”
He said indigenous communities
will have to remain vigilant when mining companies encroach on areas
considered as ancestral domain.
--William B. Depasupil
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