CLARK FREEPORT -- The Anakpawis Party-list assailed the appointment of former Armed Forces Chief of Staff (AFP) General Roy Cimatu as replacement of rejected former secretary Gina Lopez of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.
Anakpawis Party-list representative Ariel “Ka Ayik” Casilao said that the environment is “doomed or fated to be ruined under Cimatu’s leadership.”
“Cimatu and the military have a symbiotic relationship with mining and logging, hence, it is all but natural for him to favor the interests of mining firm at the cost of environmental destruction and displacement of farmer communities,” Casilao said in a press statement Wednesday.
The lawmaker took cue from contentions of the environmental group Kalikasan that Cimatu was allegedly involved with the “Task Force Lumad” in 1994, which was led by the 603rd Brigade of the Philippine Army that acted as protectors of the Alsons logging tenement and trainers of para-militaries.
This was the military response against the “pangayaw” or armed resistance of Ata-Manobo lumad leaders against the logging operations controlled by the said company, which is owned by the rich Alcantara family of Mindanao.
In 2008, the AFP was also instructed to form the Investment Defense Force (IDF), which was mandated to protect economic activities, including destructing mining operations, according to Casilao.
The incident, he added, was brought about by the massive deployment of Special Civilian Armed Auxiliary (SCAA) at mining sites that repressed people’s protest and campaigns to protect the environment.
The party list head claimed that this was affirmed by the Aquino regime in 2011, resulting to a more intensive deployment of para-militaries. SCAA and other para-military groups acted as IDF, for the interests of mining and other big companies.
“Mining and other environmentally-destructive projects are the ‘kumikitang kabuhayan’ of the AFP, the institution that molded Cimatu, thus, his appointment is obviously to reverse the pro-people decisions of Sec. Lopez,” Casilao said.
Casilao also urged President Duterte to reconsider his appointment of Cimatu and replace him with an environmental defender.
“Cimatu will literally undermine the people’s trust of the president, when the destructive impact of the resumption of mining operations is already felt by the many sectors, especially by the indigenous people and farmers,” Casilao said.