Palawan wants share of Malampaya revenues

Former Interior and Local Government Secretary Cesar Sarino, who drafted the Local Government Code, joined Palawan residents yesterday in filing a court petition compelling the national government to give the province its rightful 40 percent share of revenues from the multibillion-peso Camago-Malampaya oil and natural gas project.

Sarino’s lawyers, along with the founders and members of the Palawan-based Kilusan Love Malampaya, said President Arroyo’s declaration that Malampaya is not part of the province is an "unconstitutional surrender" of the country’s claims to its territorial waters.

In their petition filed with the Puerto Princesa City Regional Trial Court, Sarino and retired University of the Philippine professor Oscar Evangelista, former Palawan provincial budget officer Caesar Ventura, outgoing provincial board member Gerardo Ortega and youth leaders Renato Tenorio Jr. and Michael Dalabajan, argued that the President’s allocation of a certain amount for Palawan without an appropriation from Congress was illegal because it involved public funds.

In a press conference in Manila, Sarino and lawyers Harry Roque and Romel Bagares accused the President and her Cabinet of having committed grave abuse of discretion for treating the Camago-Malampaya oil and gas field as outside Palawan’s territory.

They said Executive Orders 254 and 254-A should not be enforced for being illegal and that the disbursement of funds for Palawan in accordance with the two EOs should be disallowed.

The petitioners further argued that Palawan and the national government should be barred from entering into any memorandum of agreement on the sharing of proceeds of the Camago-Malampaya oil and gas project, saying this violates the Local Government Code and the 1987 Constitution.

They urged the court to direct the national government to release Palawan’s 40-percent share of the proceeds of the Camago-Malampaya oil and natural gas project, based on Article 290 of the Local Government Code and the relevant constitutional provision.