Professional Documents
Culture Documents
THE NEWSWEEK
VOL. 1 NO. 15 AN INTRA-COMPANY OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE RAPU-RAPU POLYMETALLIC PROJECT Sept. 25 - Oct. 1, 2006
A class suit filed against LPI group of companies at the Makati Re- The court, through the pen of Judge Dina Pestano Teves of Makati
gional Trial Court was dismissed last September 6, 2006. The order RTC Branch 142, ruled in favor of Lafayette based on two points:
effectively denied the petitioners an issuance of a writ of prelimi- 1. The court finds that this case, which tried to establish a complaint
nary injunction with a temporary restraining order to prevent the of pollution, involves specialized knowledge, experience, and ser-
company from operating and for respondent Secretary Reyes from vices of an administrative tribunal (in this case, the Pollution Adju-
continuing the conduct of the test run. The court agreed with the re- dication Board PAB) and thus lends itself to the doctrine of primary
spondents that “the order of the public respondent Secretary of a 30- jurisdiction. “Section 19 of EO 192 vested the PAB with the spe-
day trial run is only a part and parcel of the exercise of its primary cific power to adjudicate pollution cases in general.” 2. The filing
jurisdiction over the pollution issue in Rapu-Rapu area” and of the case in the RTC goes against the doctrine of exhaustion of
that…”the court is therefore barred to determine a controversy in- administrative remedies and is one of the grounds for the dismissal
volving a question which is within the jurisdiction of PAB.” Thus of the complaint. The court contends that the petitioners should
this legal victory allows for the company to continue on its test run have sought remedies first with the proper administrative agency
and clears all legal hurdles so far thus brought against it by mali- (in this case, the PAB) which has the special competence to decide
cious parties whose main purpose is to undermine the mining opera- the matter instead of taking “procedural shortcut” before the court.
tion of the company and to ride on the publicity brought about by a The petitioners’ pleading showed not only a lack of understanding
sensationalized version of the company’s affairs. of the proper operations of the company; they also showed an igno-
The petition praying for the preliminary/permanent injunction with rance of the law and its procedures. Similar error in legal proce-
temporary restraining order and damages was allegedly initiated by dures and requirements were committed by other plaintiffs in a pre-
the residents of Rapu-Rapu and symbolically by the citizens of the vious case filed against the company in the regional trial court in
Philippines. Petitioners hold that the mining operations of the com- Sorsogon. The judicial court of Sorsogon dismissed it in August 17,
pany threaten their right to a balanced and healthful ecology and 2006 for failure to secure the requisite certificate of non-forum
that the test run poses hazard to the environment. shopping. In both cases, Lafayette was ably represented by the law
firm of Atty. Cleofe Verzola.
Rapu-Rapu battered by Milenyo Dam passed the test of Milenyo
In the early evening of Sep-
tember 27, 2006, and with-
out adequate warning, Ty-
phoon Milenyo suddenly
veered away from its ex-
pected path and swooped
into the Gulf of Albay head-
ing straight for Legaspi City
at the rate of 150 kph at the
storm’s center. Peripheral winds of 180 kph hit the islands of Rapu-
Rapu and Province of Sorsogon with accompanying tidal waves, re-
sulting in massive destruction to vegetation, property, and lives.
A day after the storm, initial estimates of destruction in the directly
host communities stood at 79 houses completely destroyed: 75 in The company once and for all proved that its facilities are environ-
Malobago, 3 in Binosawan and 1 in Pagcolbon. In addition, property mentally safe. The millions of pesos spent for the environmental man-
and personal belongings were damaged or lost to the sea and the ele- agement and protection paid off when these facilities withstood the
ments. One sari-sari store in Malobago alone estimated a loss of ultimate test of nature brought by typhoon Milenyo.
300,000 pesos worth of goods. Against the unstoppable force of nature, the tailings dam stood still
The houses that were destroyed were mostly made of light materials and unshaken. It maintained an 11-meter freeboard in spite of the
erected on sandy ground. These houses were washed away when the 139mm rainfall (the rainfall recorded during the “spill” last year was
sea reclaimed the shorelines at the height of the storm. Only few posts 126.5mm). This heavy rainfall has no effect in the foundation and em-
indicate that houses once stood in the area. Fortunately for these resi- bankment of the dam.
dents, there was no casualty among them in spite of the devastation Made up of fill materials of more than 4,455,000 cubic meter of boul-
since they evacuated to safer areas hours before the storm struck.. ders and compacted clay (that’s about 445,500 truck-loads of material
using an ordinary 10-wheeler garbage truck), the dam is a mountain
itself blending with the natural topography of the area. It is now 145
meters above sea-level and has a length of 500 meters. Engineers are
confident with the integrity of the tailings dam even before the ty-
phoon struck. They said that it can even withstand an earthquake with
an intensity of 8.25 in the Richter Scale. At present, the storage capac-
ity is an astounding 1,000,000 cubic meter of water, that is enough to
fill up about 417 Olympic-size swimming pools, ten feet deep. With
the 11-meter freeboard during the typhoon, the dam can still receive
620,000 cubic meters of water.
Rapu-Rapu, page 2 Dam, page 2
Vol. 1 No. 15 THE NEWSWEEK Sept. 25 - Oct. 1, 2006