BALER, Aurora—Indigenous peoples of the Bugkalot and Ilongot tribes living at the boundaries of Nueva Vizcaya, Quirino and this province have asked President Rodrigo Duterte to resolve their decades-old problem concerning alleged environmental violations committed by the American operator of the giant Casecnan Multipurpose Irrigation and Power Project.
In a letter to the President, Bugkalot/Ilongot Confederation director Rocky Valderama Jr. sought Duterte’s intervention on the supposed violations and injustices committed by the California Energy Casecnan Water and Energy Company Inc. Officials of the company could not be reached for comment as of presstime.
Valderama accused the firm of depriving them of their share in the revenue of the Casecnan power plant, and violating their rights to their ancestral domain while raking in billions of pesos through their operations.
The revenue share was one of the 20 demands raised by the IPs before the project could start construction in 1995.
Then-President Fidel Ramos authorized the CMIPP to build the facility, provided these demands were met and a task force created to monitor their implementation, Valderama added.
“President Duterte, you are the only hope of the Bugkalots and Ilongots. Help us resolve this matter,” Valderama wrote.
One of CECWECI’s glaring environmental violations, he said, was the drying up of the Casecnan River after its huge volume of water was diverted, leaving only a trickle to proceed downstream.
Valderama said the firm violated its agreement with the National Irrigation Administration before the dam was constructed that it would only utilize 1.6 percent of the 49 billion cubic meters of water in the river.
“Instead of using just 1.6% of the water, CECWECI utilized the full 49 billion cubic meters, which emptied the Casecnan River,” he said.
CECWECI is a subsidiary of the Mid-American Energy Company, which built the build-operate-transfer component of the Casecnan project in 1995, involving a 26-kilometer underground transbasin tunnel that diverts water from the Taang and Casecnan rivers in Nueva Vizcaya to the Pantabangan Dam in Nueva Ecija.
Completed in December 2001, the $580-million BOT component guarantees an annual inflow of 800 million cubic meters of water to Pantabangan Dam, irrigating an additional 35,000 hectares on top of the 102,000 hectares serviced by the dam.
Valderama said because no water is flowing in the Casecnan River, this destroyed the natural habitat of “ludong,” a fish species that is the IPs primary source of livelihood. Ludong sells at P4,000 to P5,000 a kilo, he said.
With the Casecnan River no longer teeming with aquatic life, indigenous fishermen in nine barangays of Nagtipunan in Quirino and Barangay Pelaway, Alfonso Castaneda in Nueva Vizcaya have stopped fishing. “Before, we have fish festivals during summer but now, we no longer have any,” he said.
Aside from the loss of livelihood, people who used to cross the river could no longer travel by boat to their destinations, he added.
Valderama said CECWECI’s operations not only deprived them of their livelihood but also destroyed their culture and long-standing traditional practices. He said their group has exhausted every conceivable legal avenue to no avail.
“We have even gone to the House of Representatives, which formed a fact-finding committee which came out with findings that affirmed our claims,” he said.
He said various government agencies such as the NIA, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the National Water Resources Board, and the Department of Finance did not act on their petition for redress of grievances.