MGB head preempted SC — mining exec

Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) Director Horacio C. Ramos, who was accused last week of circumventing the Philippine Mining Act of 1995 to favor foreign-owned mining companies, is again under fire for "preempting the Supreme Court" by converting financial and/or technical assistance agreements (FTAAS) into exploration permits.

Dioterepis Bautista, a mining contractor and president of local firm Dopester Minerals, said that the High Court has yet to decide on the case which was filed by a group of non-government organizations (NGOs) in 1997.

The issue, said Bautista, is whether to prioritize the economic benefits brought about by foreign capital investments or the constitutional ban on foreign utilization of the country’s natural resources. "But Ramos has beat them to the draw by converting the FTAAS into exploration permit applications (EPAs), " he added.

The EPAs allow foreign companies to conduct exploration activities in the country without bringing in the corresponding investments.

The scheme will enable "the FTAA applicants-turned-EPA holders to maintain their claims without being bothered by the 81,000-hectare area restriction," revealed Bautista. "Neither will they have to comply with a possible Supreme Court decision ordering FTAA applicants to divest their excess acreage to the government so that these may be opened to domestic corporations."

"Ramos’s conversion of FTAAs into exploration permit applications (EPAs) would render any Supreme Court decision moot and academic because there are no more foreign-owned FTAAA applications to be declared unconstitutional or otherwise," the Dopester executive added.

Republic Act 7942, otherwise known as the Philippine Mining A ct of 1995, decrees that FTAA applicants may be granted a maximum contract area of 81,000 hectares each. DAO 96-40 or the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of RA 7942 further states that excess FTAA areas should be divested in favor of the government.