Indigenous Action Against Mining Hold Australian Firm At Bay in the Philippines

2008-01-17
NUEVA VIZCAYA, Philip­pines- Trib­al vil­lagers up north Luzon block­ad­ed the Aus­tralian min­ing com­pa­ny from fur­ther explor­ing min­er­als in their com­mu­ni­ty, Fri­day noon, and forced the min­ing firm to leave the vil­lage.

Rabbit under fence2008-01-17
NUEVA VIZCAYA, Philip­pines- Trib­al vil­lagers up north Luzon block­ad­ed the Aus­tralian min­ing com­pa­ny from fur­ther explor­ing min­er­als in their com­mu­ni­ty, Fri­day noon, and forced the min­ing firm to leave the vil­lage.

Accord­ing to reports, hun­dred dozens of indige­nous res­i­dents in Kasi­bu town ‚“pushed away employ­ees of a for­eign min­ing firm and their earth-mov­ing equip­ment that were sup­posed to start explo­ration in their com­mu­ni­ty”, said Inq.Net. The action held by local peo­ple has lead to an indef­i­nite oper­a­tion shut down of OceanaGold Philip­pines Inc.- an Aus­tralian com­pa­ny.

Indige­nous res­i­dents were only pro­tect­ing the Papaya water­shed that feed the Alimudin, Mal­ong and Pah­d­u­an rivers. These are the main sources of irri­ga­tion for about 150,000 fruit trees in Mal­abing Val­ley, which has six vil­lages. But the min­ing firm came in with­out con­sent among the vil­lagers and threat­en their means of exis­tence.

This is what the Aus­tralian Min­ing Com­pa­ny has said in their media release:
“OceanaGold offi­cials insist they no longer need proof of con­sent from the com­mu­ni­ty since they have a Finan­cial and Tech­ni­cal Assis­tance Agree­ment (FTAA) grant­ed by the gov­ern­ment in 1994 to Cli­max Min­ing Ltd.”