Dirty word
“Logger” is a dirty word in this neck of the woods. Not us, snaps San Jose Timber Corp. (SJTC). Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile’s firm logs within a 95,770-hectare area that straddles protected zones of the country’s last old-growth forest in Samar Island. SJTC claims it works by “sustainable management.”Bought in 1977 by then martial-law Defense Minister Enrile, SJTC got the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to scrub a logging moratorium. This feat affects what the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) lists as “one of the top 200 endangered spaces on the [planet].”
Catholic bishops, green groups and international foresters fret over threats to one of the world’s richest biodiversity pools. Exactly 406 of Samar’s more than 2,400 species of flowers bloom nowhere else. And it has 39 species of mammals and 197 birds. Many are endangered. “This genetic pool has incredible value,” marvels Food and Agriculture Organization forester Patrick Durst.
To protect this critical resource, the UN Development Program, the Global Environment Facility and the government launched the Samar Island Natural Park. But government often snitches with the left hand what it hands with its right. Here, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) spiked the log ban -- and stretched SJTC’s license by 16 years and five months. Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Mike Defensor’s Aug. 16, 2005 order tacked this rider for SJTC: “extension of period of said TLA equivalent to the time lapsed from 31 May 1989 until promulgation of this order.”
Extension constituted “restitution.” “Onli in da Pilipins” [Only in the Philippines], retorted the Samar Island Biodiversity Foundation in a letter to senators, church leaders and NGOs. “Extension of a TLA as ‘restitution’ never happened in the Philippines before,” wrote its president, Agustin Docena.
“Restitution,” the dictionary says, “is making good for injury done.” In a country where crime pays, the idea of making good for harm inflicted startles many. But the concept of reparation goes way back.
Some dub it the “Zacchaeus precedent.” In Luke’s account, the tax collector Zacchaeus pledged before the Master: “Half of my goods, I give to the poor. And if I’ve cheated anyone, I pay him back four times as much.” This fourfold restitution amplified the 7th Commandment, “Thou shall not steal.”
In an Orwellian country, like the Philippines, some people are more equal than others. A moneybag aristocracy dominates here. By manipulating government levers, pecuniary aristocrats grab all resources within reach. The Ten Commandments are watered down to the “Ten Suggestions.”
The result is a moral vacuum. It shuts out “restitution” -- except where the elite cash in. The powerful monopolize the Zacchaeus precedent but deny it to the weak. Eduardo Cojuangco Jr. and Ferdinand Marcos’ cronies couldn’t be bothered with “restitution” for wringing, under martial law, billions in levy from helpless coconut farmers.
Defensor’s order, in effect, says that SJTC has been prejudiced and is entitled to “restitution” -- by extension of its license. Who inflicted the harm? The Catholic bishops of Calbayog, Catarman and Borongan who supported the moratorium? The DENR?
Who calibrates the value of “restitution”? SJTC?
And how? In open hearings? Or was all this a secret, as Oliver Franks said, “in the Oxford sense—you may tell it only to one person at a time.”
Fairness is often the first victim in smoke-filled backroom negotiations. And the Catholic bishops’ pastoral letter opposing SJTC’s claim to “prior rights” makes the same point. This “legal assertion… does not reflect true justice or morality… The people of Samar have more prior rights... Justice dictates that the natural wealth of Samar Island benefit Samar’s poor, not end up (with) the already wealthy.”
Scientists have estimated losses if erosion of Samar’s biodiversity continues. “More than $40 billion in just 25 years,” says Marcelino Dalmacio, who led the UN’s Samar Biodiversity Project. “That’s more than the projected value of bauxite minerals. And it’s definitely greater than timber.”
Water accounts for more than 80 percent of the bill, Dalmacio adds. “Water will suffer consequences of logging and mining, particularly in karst (limestone) areas.” Underground cave systems in the country’s largest karst region would crumble from logging trucks.
Beyond price tags is the “killing curve.” Plant and animal genes form life’s building blocks. They spin off into diverse products, from high-yielding seeds to anti-cancer drugs. Only 15 percent have been studied. Of today’s 300,000 plants, only 200 or so appear on our dinner tables. Three crops -- rice, maize and wheat -- provide most of energy.
Yet, Oxford University’s Norman Myers estimates that some 30,000 species slip into extinction every year, compared with “two or three lost every five years or so before man appeared.” This “genetic library” took eons to evolve. “Its destruction would wreck the very systems that enable us to feed the world,” warns Thai Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, a recipient of the Ramon Magsaysay Award. “It would foreclose options for generations coming after us.”
Biodiversity loss is irreversible. There is no recall mechanism from obliteration. Who’ll make restitution for such damage? Forest cover here stood at 57 percent in 1934. It’s been whittled down to 18 percent today -- and is still dropping.
The Samar Island Biodiversity Foundation prodded the Senate to consider the “restitution” flap when selecting Commission on Appointments representatives. The foundation asks: Did Defensor swap extension-plus-restitution for Enrile’s vote in confirming his appointment?
Were you born yesterday?
