MindaNews » COMMENTARY: The titans clash but where is mining headed to?.

By Edwin G. Espejo, Minda News
March 4, 2012

GENERAL SANTOS CITY (MindaNews/03 March) — Two prominent persons representing the richest families in the country let their hair down and let loose scathing remarks against each other in front of national television in a forum Friday on the future of the mining industry in the Philippines.

Manny Pangilinan, whose vast business empire has made him one of the most influential persons in the country, traded barbs with Regina Lopez, she of the old rich Lopez family who are into mass media and communication, real estate and utilities.

While the two shared the same table during the mining conference, they are as diametrically opposed to each other as the west is to the east as far as mining issues are concerned.

Lopez, whose anti-mining advocacy has rubbed off members of her own elite class, claimed the Philippines is better off developing its agriculture and tourism industries than destroying the forests and timberland in the name of mining.

Pangilinan retorted that the country cannot move out of its backward economy without harnessing its mining potential even rattling off the precious metal components of one’s indispensable mobile phone.

Pangilinan owns Smart Communications Inc., the country’s largest mobile communications provider with over 60 million subscribers (including that of its recently acquired Sun Cellular Inc.), and is also into the television industry where the Lopezes hold sway and are the acknowledge industry leader.  Pangilinan is also the president of Philex Mining, one of the country’s largest operating mining companies today.

Beyond their personal differences and rhetoric, Pangilinan and Lopez represent two contrasting and opposing camps on the mining issue in the country today.

Pangilinan took the cudgels for the mining industry, which has traditionally drawn support from the country’s chamber of commerce, also offered middle ground where both government and the industry could resolve issues on revenue sharing and strict monitoring of the environment.

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