Miners broke into padlocked mine—exec
By Delmar Cariño
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 03:43:00 10/05/2008
ITOGON, Benguet, Philippines—The abandoned Antamok mine where 16 miners were trapped starting late last month was to become a model of a community-based scheme that big mining companies could adopt under the People’s Small-Scale Mining Act (Republic Act No. 7076) of 1991.
But the scheme did not materialize because an attempt to renegotiate the terms of the joint-venture agreement with a group of small-scale miners failed, Benguet Corp. general manager Isabelo Velez Jr. told the Inquirer on Saturday.
“This prompted Benguet Corp. to cease and abandon its operations in the area. But we [installed] iron grills to close the portals,” he said.
Velez also said the miners who entered the tunnel at the height of Typhoon “Nina” on Sept. 22 were on their own because they had no permit to work there.
Of the 16 trapped miners, only 10 survived.
Lomino Kaniteng, president of the Benguet Federation of Small-Scale Miners, said a successful renegotiation of terms could have prevented the tragedy because the company would have been compelled to implement safety measures.
Kaniteng expressed support for Benguet Gov. Nestor Fongwan’s call for an investigation of the incident to determine the liability, if any, of the small-scale miners, the Mines and Geosciences Bureau and Benguet Corp.
Shift in strategy
Velez said Benguet Corp. became open to joint-venture agreements with small-scale miners after the company decided to stop its large-scale operation years ago.
The move represented a shift from big investment to a community-based, production-sharing strategy that allowed small-scale miners to look for gold and earn from it, he said.
Velez said the company had existing agreements with 14 other small-scale miners’ associations in its operations in Acupan.
But its two-year venture with the Spanish Empire Pocket Miners Association Inc. (Sepmai) was not renewed in 2006 because of differences in the sharing scheme, he said.
The original agreement required every miner who entered the tunnel to pay the company P15 each, and whatever they mined would be theirs.
Sepmai has around 2,000 members, Kaniteng said.
60-40 sharing
Velez said the renegotiations bogged down on an impasse over the sharing scheme.
He said the company offered 60-40 sharing, with the miners getting the bigger percentage of the production, but the latter refused.
“We also incur a lot of expenses for safety measures in the tunnels, so we believed that the proposal was proper,” Velez said.
Sepmai members, however, said they would be shortchanged considering the difficult and dangerous working conditions in the mines.
They said they were actually left to fend for themselves because the company did not install the necessary equipment.
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