Semirara Island residents oppose relocation

FARMERS in Sitio Poocan in Barangay Tinogboc, Semirara Island, in Antique province, block a bulldozer of Semirara Mining Corp., which was used by the municipal government of Caluya in taking over a disputed property being claimed by the farmers. Police dispersed the protest and arrested the group’s leader on Feb. 28. PHOTO COURTESY OF PAKISAMA

ILOILO CITY, Philippines—Hundreds of residents on Semirara Island in Antique province are opposing their relocation by the municipal government of Caluya, according to the Commission on Human Rights (CHR).

Lawyer Jonnie Dabuco, CHR  regional assistant director, said the residents of Sitio Sabang in Barangay (village) Tinogboc told a CHR team they did not want to leave their community and transfer to Sitio Poocan in the same village.

“[The] majority, if not most, of those we have talked with are opposing their relocation,” Dabuco told the Inquirer.

He said the villagers feared the loss of their livelihood, which was based on fishing and seaweed-gathering, and their source of water.

They also did not want to dislocate their children who are studying in an elementary school in their community.

Municipal legal officer Voltaire Gumban denied that the majority of the residents of Sabang were against the relocation.

“We simply could not leave this project, which is a free housing project, in the hands of some disgruntled few who, for one reason or another, have incited some quarters in opposing this lofty endeavor of the [town],” Gumban said in a text message.

Caluya plans to transfer more than 100 families to a 5-hectare relocation site in Poocan where new houses will be constructed by the town and Semirara Mining Corp. (SMC).

Semirara Island hosts SMC, which is operated by David M. Consunji Inc.  and is one of Asia’s biggest coal mines.

It is one of the nine islands comprising Caluya in Antique at the northern end of Panay Island.

Caluya Mayor Genevive Lim-Reyes said Sabang residents would have to be transferred to Poocan because the land they were occupying had been reverted from the municipal government to the private donor.

The municipal government will provide facilities and a livelihood project in the relocation site, Reyes said. It has also offered to compensate them for the  plants and trees that would be affected, she added.

A group of Poocan residents led by the farmers group Sabang-Poocan Farmers, Fishermen Association Inc. (Sapoffa) is also opposing the proposed relocation site, which they claimed would include their farmlands.

“We have been living and farming here for as long as 30 years. Why are they forcing us to leave?” Angie Ysug, Sapoffa spokesperson, said.

Gumban said these claims over farmlands were “baseless.”

The municipal government is claiming ownership of the property, which Reyes said included 3 ha donated by the Janairo family and another 2 ha  bought by the town from the same family.

On Feb. 28, police stopped the protest of Poocan residents and arrested Sapoffa president Bernard Magdaug for illegal assembly.

The Antique 6th Municipal Circuit Trial Court found probable cause for the offense against Magdaug but ordered his release on March 3 without  bail.

Bulldozers and other heavy equipment of SMC have started clearing the 5-ha property.

Reyes and Gumban had earlier denied talks that the vacated property in Sabang would be utilized by SMC.

The mayor, whose husband is a scion of the Consunji clan that owns SMC, said her personal relations had no bearing on the relocation project.