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By Ma. Ester L. Espina, Correspondent
BACOLOD CITY: What was merely an issue of energy
vs. environment has now exacerbated with opposing parties bent on
using their children to sway government and the courts to their
side.
The Save Mount Kanlaon Coalition filed a
class suit on Thursday with more than 80 children in the frontlines
against the Department of Natural Resources and Environment (DENR),
the Park Assets Management Board and the Energy Development
Corporation (EDC) for the latter’s plan to conduct geothermal
exploration development at the buffer zone of Mount Kanlaon Natural
Park in Negros Occidental.
In their class suit, the respondents
included children as young as seven-month-old Daniel Coruna,
grandson of petitioners’ lawyer, Andrea Si.
This prompted beneficiaries of the EDC,
then Philippine National Oil Company (PNOC), to go public themselves
and declare their willingness to let their children, numbering in
thousands, to rally behind EDC and seek the sympathy of the courts
to hear their plea as well.
Edmund Cantanilla, federation president of
the 31 farmers organizations in Barangays Mailum and Minoyan, host
villages of the geothermal plant, said their children are “set to
lose a lot” if the courts will grant the temporary restraining
order filed by the opposition.
In January of this year, PNOC-EDC
requested the provincial government’s nod to enter the 169-hectare
buffer zone so they can extract geothermal steam which is pegged to
provide the province with not less than 40 megawatts of power.
The entry will however entail cutting of
forest trees to pave way for the company’s civil works and the
construction of the well pads. Environmentalists claimed this would
cause destruction in the forest’s biodiversity.
EDC on the other hand, clarified that they
would not only need 12.5 hectares of the buffer zone and while
identifying some 4,000 trees will have to be cleared; only 34 of
these are huge ones, contrary to claims of the opposing parties.
Since a law allows the entry of EDC into the
buffer zone, DENR issued a tree-cutting permit to EDC and after six
months, the provincial council also gave their nod along with strict
conditions one of which being the reforestation of 400 hectares.
The opposition brought their case to court as a
last recourse to stop EDC from entering the buffer zone.
With the recent development, local
officials and residents of the host barangays went public themselves
to appeal the benefits they are set to lose if the courts will side
with the opposition.
“Since they now resorted to be using their
children, we will also bring our children to fight for their
future,” Cantanilla said in the vernacular.
He added that it is not only their livelihood
that will be affected but as well as their children’s education,
explaining that for more than a decade now, EDC has adopted more
than 10 elementary and high schools, taking care of their
children’s educational needs including allowances.
Cantanilla also said that their farmers’
organizations, numbering in more than a thousand individuals, will
lose their benefits, adding that their vegetable and flower farms
have thrived since EDC helped them out in their marketing skills.
“If the opposition are fighting this on
the basis of environmental concerns, they should know that we will
back them up,” Cantanilla said, adding that the environment is
vital to their farms as well which is why they have been helping
guard the 120 hectares already reforested by PNOC-EDC since 1996.
Luis Pojas, barangay captain of Mailum,
Bago City, said their partnership with EDC has resulted to
farm-to-market roads and has uplifted the lives of the people in
their community.
Brgy. Capt. Elmor Juanitas of Minoyan, Murcia,
on the other hand said “no other company has complied with its
social responsibility more than PNOC-EDC,” citing capitalization
for farmers’ groups and technical trainings that “resulted in
increased productivity among our farms.”
Juanitas said he is an environmentalist himself
and would be the first to oppose EDC’s plan if he knows this will
just lead to the abuse of the environment.
“But I have seen and worked alongside the
company and we have planted trees together, something that those
claiming to be environmentalists have yet to show,” Juanitas
added.
Cantanilla was more emotional and scathingly
said, “Those so-called environmentalists are rich ones and their
children will not be deprived of anything. What about our children?
Without EDC, their future will become dim again.”
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