The Supreme Court has reversed its earlier ruling junking the petition for a writ of kalikasan filed by Quezon City homeowners and residents seeking to stop the expansion and operation of the Payatas dump.
In a resolution dated Sept. 1 and released on Monday by clerk of court Felipa Anama, the high tribunal granted the motion for reconsideration filed by the petitioners.
At the same time, it issued a writ of kalikasan against the respondents and referred the case to Court of Appeals for hearing, reception of evidence and rendition of judgment.
The respondents were ordered to make a verified return of the writ before the appellate court within 10 days from receiving notice in compliance with Section 8, Rule 7, of the rules of procedure for environment case.
The petitioners—mostly members of eight homeowners associations living in an urban poor resettlement area near the dump—had complained to the high court in March that IPM Environment Services Inc., the Quezon City government’s private garbage disposal contractor, was encroaching on the Lupang Pangako resettlement area created in the mid-1980s.
They claimed that some IPM personnel were threatening and harassing them into selling or vacating their lots in line with the city government’s plans to expand the sanitary landfill.
The expansion of the dump, the petitioners said, was disrupting the landfill and the soil, exposing them to obnoxious odors and fumes, germs and other toxins which cause harmful diseases.
The Supreme Court, however, denied their petition on March 24 “for being incomplete in form and insufficient in substance.”
The respondents in the suit include IPM, Quezon City officials led by Mayor Herbert Bautista and several others from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources’ Environment Management Bureau.