Sunday, January 13, 2008 Group ready to sue DENR over ‘bribe’
ENVIRONMENTALISTS are preparing charges against Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) officials whom they accused of accepting a P50,000 bribe before the exploratory oil drilling began in the Tañon Strait.
The money, allegedly from the Japan Oil Exploration Co. Ltd. (Japex), was supposed to enable the agency to revive the Protected Area Management Board (PAMB).
Speaking at a forum at the University of San Carlos-Talamban yesterday, lawyer Gloria Estenzo Ramos said that in one of their meetings called by Director Antonio Labios of the Department of Energy (DOE) last October, a Japex representative admitted to have given P50,000 to DENR.
They needed the PAMB to pass a resolution endorsing the oil exploration project, which is a required document. The exploratory drilling began last Nov. 15.
Estenzo did not name names.
During a forum last October, the representative of a Japex contractor said that they gave P50,000 to the government to speed up the reactivation of PAMB. Because Tañon Strait is a protected seascape, the explorers needed the PAMB’s favorable resolution before it could begin.
Under the National Integrated Protected Areas System (Nipas) Act, the PAMB decides on the planning, resource protection and administration of a protected area.
Estenzo said that the Japex representative “was even proud” about the doleout. She said that the DENR and DOE officials also admitted to have received P50,000.
“So right now we are going to prepare a case. We are going to file this with the (Office of the) Ombudsman,” Estenzo said.
It is clear that PAMB was reconstituted, after five years of being inactive, because DENR officials were given money, she added.
Vince Cinches of the Fisherfolk Development Center, who was present in yesterday’s forum, also questioned the donation of P50,000 to PAMB by Japex.
However, in an earlier interview, DOE Legal Officer Philip Adviento explained that the money was first turned over to DOE and it was his agency that donated the amount to the PAMB, which had no budget for its operations.
Dr. Lemuel Aragones, a professor of the UP Institute of Environmental Science and Meteorology, said that it seems the DENR officials were hiding something because he was barred from being a member of the PAMB, despite his expertise.
Aragones urged the government to review the oil exploration project so they may know the extent of the damage it can cause. (EOB)
