Green groups ask new AFP chief to pull our military in controversial mining project

Alyansa Tigil Mina wrote the new Armed Forces chief of staff Lt. Gen. Emmanuel Bautista calling for an investigation on the increased presence of military in the communities surrounding the Tampakan Copper-Gold Project and total pullout of the said military detachments.

Jaybee Garganera, ATM national coordinator said: “We believe that the presence of military detachments in Tampakan and nearby villages will heighten the tension in the area and further escalate the threat of human rights violations against anti-mining communities, especially indigenous peoples.”

In January 16, MindaNews, a local newspaper in Mindanao reported that additional military were deployed in Sitio Lafla, Datal Alyong, and Datal Biao in the Municipality of Bong Mal, in Kiblawan Davao del Sur.

A recent and controversial case is the massacre of the Capion Family in Bong Mal in October 18 last year, which was immediately admitted to by the 27th Infantry Battalion of the Philippine Army led by Lt. Col. Dante Jimenez. At that time, the Philippine Army was under the command of Bautista.

Garganera added: “We are gravely dismayed that the Court Martial has not been convened, when reports show that the military failed to follow rules of engagement.”

Jimenez and his team were only suspended after the said incident.

In the letter received by the AFP chief yesterday, ATM cited Bautista’s acceptance speech:

“calling for an end to armed violence and in advocating for peace, to allow us to focus on the important task of securing the sovereignty of our state and the integrity of our national territory and protecting our people from the adverse effect of climate change and environmental degradation.” (PDI, 18 January 2013)

“In this case, if Lt. Gen. Bautista is sincere when he said in hi speech that–we felt it is only right for him to command the military to pull out from sites where there are no intelligence or basis of counterinsurgency or reason for the military to roam around,” Garganera concluded.

Earlier reports identified Lt. Gen. Bautista as the brains of Oplan Bayanihan, a counterinsurgency program of then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Alyansa Tigil Mina is an alliance of mining-affected communities and their support groups of NGOs/POs and other civil society organizations who are opposing the aggressive promotion of large-scale mining in the Philippines. The alliance is currently pushing for a moratorium on mining, revocation of Executive Order 270-A, repeal of the Mining Act of 1995 and passage of the AMMB. (30)

For more information:

Jaybee Garganera, ATM National Coordinator, nc@alyansatigilmina.net, 09277617602
Farah Sevilla, Policy Research and Advocacy Officer, policy@alyansatigilmina.net, 0915-3313361

Visit our website: http://www.alyansatigilmina.net
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Alyansa-Tigil-Mina/141872819244724?ref=ts&fref=ts
Twitter: atm_philippines

Press Release
January 23, 2013

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