Lawyer calls for abolition of ‘schizophrenic’ DENR

By Alex Pal
Inquirer Visayas

Posted date: August 14, 2010

Antonio Oposa, Jr., pioneer in the study of environmental law in the Philippines and considered one of Asia’s leading voices in international environmental law, said the DENR has to be abolished because it has two conflicting functions that leaves it continually in a dilemma between conservation or mineral exploitation.

“Conservation has no money. Mining has money. So, in a debate, guess who wins?” said Oposa, a 2009 Ramon Magasaysay awardee.

Oposa was here last Thursday for an assessment on the Protected Area Management Effectiveness held at Silliman University, organized by the Dr. Jovito Salonga Center for Law and Development and the German Development Service.

Oposa said the DENR had a highly difficult task to fulfill its mandate.

“Show me a mining company that has been closed down because of pollution without causing an uproar – none, because mining has money,” he said.

He said the proposal to abolish the DENR and replace it with two separate agencies for conservation and mineral utilization was conceived before the elections and he was pursuing this move with friends in Congress.

In its place, the plan is to put up the National Environmental Protection Agency as a separate office from the Department of Natural Resources, which will regulate the utilization of the country’s natural resources.

He said the concern over the protection of the Philippines’ natural resources is urgent because the Philippines has among the richest terrestrial ecosystems in the world.

“Pound for pound, hectare for hectare, the Philippines is the richest land on Earth, but the budget for protected areas is only P70 million — only 70 percent of one percent of the national budget,” Oposa said.

The idea of fusing the offices of the Environment and Natural Resources was good in the beginning, Oposa noted. But in the end, “you cannot have a person who is thrifty and at the same time is an addicted gambler."

He added: "You have, in the department, people who are thrifty for conservation, yet you have the thrust of the same department where people who are gambling irreparably and irreversibly on the natural wealth of the country. You cannot have that. You will have Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde,” he said.

Oposa said he has talked with some senators about this idea and got the support of Sen. Miguel Zubiri, who has filed a bill proposing the abolition of DENR in favor of the two separate agencies.

He said he has not yet heard of a similar bill filed in the House of Representatives.