HB 6342 could halt all mining

IF House Bill (HB) 6342 is passed, all mining activities could halt.

Is it the Aquino administration’s wish for Congress to pass the Alternative Mining Bill, or House Bill 6342? The bill, which is offered by its authors to replace the existing Mining Act of 1995, contains a provision that calls for a moratorium on “all mining activities until all the systems are in place for the proper implementation of the law.”

The bill also provides that “all existing mining permits, licenses and agreements are deemed cancelled.”

The stoppage of all mining activities—until the government can make sure that all the safeguards against environmental pollution from mining projects, the rights of indigenous people to the profits and benefits of these projects are assured, and all corrupt practices involved in existing projects disappear—is the wish of Alyansa Tigil Mina, the broad coalition of cause-oriented organizations.

CBCP also wants abrogation

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has also urged President Benigno Aquino 3rd to protect and preserve the country’s natural resources by abrogating the Mining Act of 1995.

“We are calling for the abrogation of the Mining Act of 1995, [which does] not adequately protect the interest of our people and the country’s natural resources,” CBCP President Tandag Bishop Nereo Odchimar said in a letter to President Aquino on July 12, 2010.

When President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo was still in office the CBCP also called on her to halt all large-scale mining because of the permanent damage they make on the delicate balance necessary for a sound ecology and destroy the livelihood of small farmers, fisher folks and indigenous peoples.

Not only has the CBCP called on President Aquino to work for the abrogation of the Mining Act of 1995, it also wants him to revoke Executive Order 270-A, defining the National Policy Agenda on Revitalizing Mining in the Philippines, which former President Arroyo issued in 2004.

“It is within your capacity, Mr. President, to revoke this executive order to give a strong signal to our people that now you have the genuine good of the Filipinos at heart,” Odchimar’s letter says.

The bishops also wish all anomalous and controversial mining contracts that the previous government entered into with investors in mining to be reviewed.

“We are expecting this new government to turn away from the policy of secrecy that characterized the previous administration. The best instruments we could use in safeguarding the interests of our nation are transparency and sincerity in heeding the voice of the people, who are the true beneficiaries and stakeholders of the country’s resources,” the letter says.

Meanwhile, environmentalists have received a new weapon from the Supreme Court: the Writ of Kalikasan (or the Writ of Nature).

The writ makes it faster for courts to act on environmental cases.

It seems that this is the first time such a writ, which has the same compulsion behind the Writ of Amparo and the Writ of Habeas Data, has been promulgated in the world. –Manila Times