Workers cut down trees along West Insular Village in Davao City to make way for the construction of the Samal Island-Davao City Connector Bridge on Thirsday, 09 May 2024. MindaNews photo by MANMAN DEJETO
DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 17 May) – City Councilor Temujin “Tek” Ocampo, chair of the committee on environment and natural resources, lacks a “sense of urgency” for his “unawareness” that trees were being cut near West Insular Village in Lanang to give way to the Samal Island-Davao City (SIDC) connector bridge project, an environment group said.
Ocampo, who expressed surprise in a press conference last Tuesday when journalists told him that some 200 trees were cut near the village, said that he, together with the City Environment and Natural Resources Office, will investigate and that if they see any violations, the regional office of the Department of Public Works and Highways will “have to answer for it”.
Ocampo, however, said that national projects like the SIDC connector bridge project, “cannot just be stopped unless the city government opposes it, or all councilors will go against the project.”
Mark Peñalver, Interfacing Development Interventions for Sustainability (IDIS) executive director, said it is “telling that the city councilor lacks a certain level of sense of urgency” in environmental issues like what happened in Lanang.
“He holds a position where he can lobby for pertinent laws related to the environment in the city, and yet, he is not aware [of the cutting of trees in Lanang]?” Peñalver told reporters in Cebuano on the sidelines of IDIS’ travel vloggers seminar-workshop forum at the Davao City Investment Promotion Center building on Wednesday afternoon.
The IDIS official said Republic Act Number 7160, also known as the Local Government Code of 1991, empowers local government units to demand consultations with the national government.
Chapter 1, Section 2c of the law states that it is the state’s policy “to require all national agencies and offices to conduct periodic consultations with appropriate local government units, non-governmental and people’s organizations, and other concerned sectors of the community before any project or program is implemented in their respective jurisdictions”.
“Unsa na lang ang ambag as LGU kung ana… it seems wala siya’y sense of urgency (What will be LGU’s contributions if that’s the case, it seems he has no sense of urgency),” he added.
Aside from the road project, Peñalver said Ocampo’s support for waste-to-energy (WTE) projects is “contradictory of his committee,” saying it could “damage the environment and will not solve garbage woes, rather it would contribute more to air pollution”.
Ocampo said the city’s WTE project with the Japan International Cooperation Agency was put on hold.
He said JICA clarified that it will not fund the project itself, only the feasibility study for it.
Peñalver also noted that hearings done by Ocampo’s committee, such as those on the alleged illegal encroachers in Sitio Kalatung, Barangay Tawantawan, Baguio District and waste disposal problems in several barangays in the city, have not moved beyond the committee.
He said it is Ocampo’s call on how these committee hearings will be conducted, for how long, and what solutions they can craft.
“We want him to act with urgency regarding what happened, considering it is very serious, so he should take it upon himself to conduct an investigation under his committee,” he said. (Ian Carl Espinosa/MindaNews)
