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Friday, February 04, 2005
NDF dares Arroyo on total log ban
By Lizanilla J. Amarga
* Rebel spokesman say legal loggers are biggest destroyers
Two major lumber firms in Region 10 named as principal "forest destroyers"
ALONG with many more medium-sized logging companies, the "biggest and worst destroyers" of Mindanao forests are the so-called "legal loggers" aided by environment officials and the military, the local National Democratic Front (NDF)-Mindanao disclosed Thursday.
This came even as the communist group challenged President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to declare a total log ban in Mindanao.
Interior and Local Governments Secretary Angelo Reyes called on all regional directors to conduct an inquiry into reports that local officials had become coddlers of illegal loggers.
NDF-Mindanao spokesperson Jorge "Ka Oris" Madlos told Sun.Star Cagayan de Oro Thursday that it is the so-called "legal loggers" who are the "biggest and worst destroyers" of Mindanao forests.
He said the Integrated Forest Management Agreement (IFMA), Community-based Forest Management (CBFM), Timber License Agreement and other schemes of the government serve as "smokescreens for wanton forest destruction."
"Concessionaires using these schemes cannot thrive without the protection from the military, politicians and the DENR (Department of Environment and Natural Resources)," he said.
In the last 50 years, Madlos said the wanton destruction of the country's forests through "legal" and illegal logging have benefited mainly the "big comprador bourgeois, the politicians, big DENR and military officials and their
US and Japanese imperialists masters."
"The insatiable greed of these privileged few is behind the ecological imbalance that brought us natural calamities resulting to the deaths of thousands of poor Filipino peasant folk, and damage to billions of property," the communist leader said.
Madlos then enumerated companies who their group believes are the "legal loggers" who are the "biggest and worst destroyers" of Mindanao forests.
This included Picop Resources, Inc. controlled by the Bernardino family with 270,000 hectares in Agusan del Sur, Surigao del Sur and Compostela Valley provinces and Nasipit and Anakan Lumber Company which covers 171,700 hectares in Agusan Del Sur, Agusan del Norte, Misamis Oriental and Bukidnon provinces.
Also, Woodland Domain Inc. which covers 54,000 hectares in Agusan Del Sur; Surigao Development Corp. in Surigao del Sur that is owned by the Puyat family and Aras-Asan Timber Corporation in Surigao del Sur.
Lip service
Sun.Star Cagayan de Oro failed to get the side of these companies as of press time Thursday.
Meanwhile, Madlos said forest destruction from "kaingin" farmers are "much limited" and therefore should not be used as "scapegoat" to conceal the culpability of these "legal" and illegal loggers.
"If the US-Arroyo regime is serious in stopping once and for all the continued denudation of Philippine forests, or Mindanao forests in particular, and start to rehabilitate the ecological balance in the whole island," he said.
He then enumerated four challenges for the Arroyo government to take action on.
This includes declaring a nationwide log ban and immediately revoke all Timber License Agreements, IFMA and other logging schemes.
By doing so, Madlos said millions of hectares of forest and logged-over areas in Mindanao alone will be spared immediately from further damage.
"The second challenge is to seriously put to stop all illegal logging activities by prosecuting all illegal loggers, AFP and PNP personnel, politicians and DENR officials who connive, consort, co-finance, and protect illegal logging," he said.
Madlos said there should also be a sincere implementation as to reforestation programs by restoring indigenous species instead of those commercial foreign species that "will only hasten the destruction rather than rehabilitate our fast vanishing tropical forest."
He said there should be "immediate implementation of a genuine land reform as fallback for those who are dependent on wood-based industry and implement national industrialization to absorb the displaced workers from logging and other wood-based industry."
"The revolutionary movement is committed to protect our forest in a way that we are capable of, considering the fact that this big time 'legal' and illegal loggers are directly protected by battalions of AFP and paramilitary units," he said.
Madlos said they are also launching reforestation and educational campaigns among the peasant masses for sustainable forest products utilization and management and to minimize if not avoid the damaging effects of "kaingin" farming.
"We call upon the people of Mindanao to unite with the whole Filipino people in exposing and opposing the lip service scheme of the US-Arroyo regime against the continuing destruction of our forest," he said.
(February 4, 2005 issue)
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