BACOLOD CITY—Energy Secretary Angelo Reyes, Negros Occidental Gov. Isidro Zayco and Mayors Ramon Torres of Bago City and Esteban Coscolluela of Murcia have been included as defendants in an amended complaint seeking to stop the entry of the Energy Development Corp. into the Mt. Kanlaon Natural Park (MKNP) buffer zone.

Lawyers Andrea Si and Andres Hagad, counsels of complainants belonging to the Save Mt. Kanlaon Coalition, filed the amended complaint Thursday before Judge Rodney Bolunia of the Bacolod Regional Trial Court Branch 44.

The original complaint only included Environment Secretary Lito Atienza Jr., EDC and the MKNP Protected Areas Management Board.

Si said Reyes and the three Negros officials were included in the case because the office of the Solicitor General, which represented Atienza at the last hearing, insisted that they were indispensable parties in the case because the governor, on behalf of the province, signed a memorandum of agreement with EDC defining the conditions for EDC’s entry into the buffer zone while Bago and Murcia will be getting royalties for their mayors’ endorsements of the project.

Zayco shrugged off his inclusion in the complaint, stressing that the province did not violate any law because Republic Act No. 9154, or the Mt. Kanlaon Natural Park Act of 2001, allows EDC to enter the buffer zone.

It was also the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, not the provincial government, that granted EDC a permit to cut trees at MKNP, he said.

What the provincial government did, he said, was to set stringent conditions to protect the environment in the 12.5-hectare area of the buffer zone that EDC has entered.

The complainants are, however, also ask ing the court to declare as unconstitutional certain sections of RA 9154 which identified the buffer zone as open for geothermal development and separate from MKNP; and to issue a temporary restraining order and injunction stopping EDC from entering the buffer zone.

Si said she asked the court to set the TRO hearing on Aug. 12.

Torres and Coscolluela in separate interviews also said they were confident the court would throw out the case against them as their endorsement of the projects did not violate any law.

Coscolluela said the complainants might as well also sue the senators and congressmen who approved RA 5194, President Fidel Ramos who signed it into law, and all other local officials who endorsed the project.

The Save Mt. Kanlaon Coalition has opposed the entry of EDC into MKNP’s buffer zone as it would destroy the rich irreplaceable biodiversity in the area.