Silica Resources Corporation (SIRC), a town mayor, and the Philippine Port Authority (PPA) are all facing complaints from the residents of Barangay Calag-calag, Ayungon, Negros Oriental before the Office of the Ombudsman Visayas.
Residents are protesting against the private port and reclamation project done by SIRC in their barangay, claiming they were affected individuals of the ongoing operations.
According to the complaint, “SIRC has not been responsive to the needs of the community like maintenance of the road damaged by the company’s constant use.”
Aside from already existing alleged violations, the 560 complaining residents of the village said they recently received information that SIRC has no mining permit record at the Mines and Geosciences Bureau Region 7 (MGB-7).
The affected residents initially sought after Mayor Edsel Enardecido’s help. The attempt, however, ended up a waste of time as Mayor Enardecido allegedly did not act on his constituents’ call.
PPA on the other hand got dragged into the said complaint after allegedly issuing a permit to SIRC allowing the construction of the port project.
SIRC is also accused of continuing construction of the port and a reclamation project despite not having a Special Use Agreement of Protected Areas (SAPA).
The said document is an instrument issued to private persons and groups that allow them to make productive use of a protected area identified under the Republic Act 7586 also known as the National Integrated Protected Areas System Act.
The site where the SIRC operations can be found is within the Tañon Strait Protected Seascape said the residents.
