‘No black sand mining in Lingayen villages’

LINGAYEN, Pangasinan, Philippines – There is no black sand mining on the shores of this capital town.

Officials of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the provincial government’s housing and urban development coordinating office and four coastal barangays here insisted this as they belied some reports.

“It’s a misnomer when you say black sand mining because they simply separated the black sand which was incidental to segregate unwanted materials like turf grass,” Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) regional director Carlos Tayag said in a press conference the other day.

Tayag said the extraction of magnetite or black sand was necessary because turf grass would not grow with its presence in the golf course area, which is being planned as part of the eco-tourism project of Gov. Amado Espino Jr.

Tayag also clarified reports about a seawall built supposedly to hide black sand mining in the area. “There is no seawall in that area, the news item saying there is, is only a hearsay, it’s not existing,” he said.

Ruben Soriano, a mining engineer at the MGB-Region 1 in La Union, revealed his team’s findings as they were sent to check the reports.

“We started our inspection in Barangay Sabangan toward the north in Estanza then to Barangay Malimpuec where the proposed eco-tourism (project) is located. Along the road we did not see any sign of extraction, much less actual extraction of magnetite sand,” Soriano told reporters.

“Then, we walked toward the beach area southward and northward, it’s clean, we did not see any excavation relative to any magnetite mining,” he added.

Engineer Alvin Bigay, head of the provincial government’s housing and urban  development coordinating office, also showed pictures taken on Tuesday showing no black sand extraction taking place in the area.

“What black sand mining are they talking about? Black sand mining never happened in Lingayen,” Bigay said.

In preparation for the golf course development, he said unwanted materials such as magnetite sand have to be extracted to allow grass and other golf course vegetation to grow, a necessity that the Environmental Management Bureau recognized and allowed.

“The shoreline is untouched; in fact wild grasses have grown there and a canvas was put on top of the separated magnetite sand so it would not be blown by the wind. Not a single ounce was shipped out from the stockpile. We were surprised when news reports came out saying there is continuous extraction in the area,” Bigay added.

No less than Sabangan councilman Vicente Oliquiño who earlier had filed a case against Espino and others over alleged black sand mining here, also told reporters in the forum that “the issue on black sand is over. We are now pushing for the eco-tourism project of the governor.”