TACLOBAN CITY – Leyte First District Board Member Roque Tiu, who is the chairman of the committees on public information and on environment, said that no mining permit was issued by the Mines and Geosciences Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources here in Leyte, to include in MacArthur town.
This was the reaction of Tiu on the query of Board Member Anlie Apostol(2nd dst) after she received complaints that a mining firm in MacArthur is currently having a commercial operation contradicting to the recent mandate from the national government declaring a moratorium on mining in the entire country.
Based on the information that Tiu received from the MGB, the agency has not issued any permit for any commercial mining operation to Nicua Mining Corporation but rather there is a pending application by the said company but the MGB has not yet issued an exploration permit to them.
“There is no information as to the issuance of a commercial mining operation permit to Nicua although the MGB had issued an extraction permit for them to extract about 25 metric tons of magnetite sand but that was long time ago,” said Tiu.
“The MGB also assures that once they decide to issue exploration permit to Nicua, they will first seek for a meeting with the members of the provincial board for consultation,” Tiu added as it was agreed during their meeting with the national officials of the MGB and officials of the provincial government.
Tiu added that Governor Jericho “Icot” Petilla had also instructed the municipal mayor of MacArthur to regularly monitor the operation of Nicua and report immediately to him any violation on their operation so he could immediately recommend suspension of the mining firm operation.
He added that the local government of MacArthur has now a negative impression in the operation of the mining firm in the said town due to the different complaints from their constituents and on the possible negative effect to the environment of the mining operations. (Roel Amazona)
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