The Claver Mineral Development Corp. on Sunday condemned a smear campaign being waged by illegal mining groups who were ousted last February by a court order from its mining claim in Carrascal, Surigao del Sur.
CMDC president Cesar Detera flatly denied that the company was engaging in illegal nickel ore mining operations and that it refused to give indigenous peoples their rightful share of revenues from mineral operations in their ancestral lands. Detera also decried the efforts to hit one of CMDC’s owners, Surigao del Sur Representative Prospero Pichay in the smear campaign.
“The truth is, CMDC under new management since October last year is proceeding with its rehabilitation of its mine site in accordance with all mining regulations and pertinent laws, including the Indigenous People’s Rights Act of 1997,” said Detera.
CMDC officials welcomed the filing of a case with the Ombudsman last Friday by a group of indigenous people who claimed that the company engaged in illegal mining operations and abused their rights by withholding their share of mining revenues.
The company officials said those who filed the case included an illegal miner operating within the CMDC mining claim and ordered ousted by the local court earlier this year.
Pichay decried the obvious attempt to put political pressure on CMDC to halt its mine site rehabilitation program. “They want to use political pressure to reverse a court decision in favor of a legitimate company providing employment and government revenues. That shouldn’t be allowed.”
Detera said an investigation would show that there are actually several other indigenous people’s groups who are also seeking this share from the operation of CMDC’s mining claim. Thus, CMDC has coordinated with the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples to pinpoint which indigenous people’s groups are entitled to a share in its operations. CMDC has also paid a substantial amount to Government representing royalties and excise tax.
A small portion of the CMDC mining claim is part of a vast area covered by Certificate of Ancestral Domain Title (CADT) No. 048 with various indigenous people’s groups filing competing claims for government entitlements including shares in mineral revenues.
Detera said the company was also talking with other indigenous people’s groups on sharing arrangements for minerals to be extracted from the CMDC mining claim outside CADT 048.
“The NCIP is aware of the dispute between the various indigenous peoples groups in our own area. We will fully comply with the revenue sharing arrangement for our indigenous brethren, once the government resolves who are the rightful claimants to this share,” said Detera.
Meanwhile, court sheriffs in February removed a group of illegal miners after CMDC won an ejectment case with the Metropolitan Trial Court in Cantillan, Surigao del Sur. The group included Datu James Biol of Agusan del Sur, a director of CCIL Mining that has been illegally extracting ore within the CMDC mining claim, and one of those who filed the Ombudsman complaint yesterday.
“Mr. Biol is not even from the area as he is from Agusan del Sur. He and other illegal miners have been extracting ore without any revenues for government or any regard for the environment. Even now CMDC is working to reverse the environmental degradation caused by the previous occupants that were stopped by the court,” said Detera.
He added that the Biol has already filed an appeal seeking to reverse the MTC decision, and thus his new complaint with the Ombudsman was a clear case of forum shopping and should mean the dismissal of the Ombudsman complaint for lack of jurisdiction.
