KORONADAL City, July 25, 2010—Indigenous peoples and advocates have criticized the government’s seeming indifference on the plight of the T’bolis in Barangay Ned, Lake Sebu.

Datu Victor Danyan, Chairperson of the T’boli-Manubo Sdaf Claimants Organization (TAMASCO), speaking in the dialect, said that “the government is hurting us more by not listening and respecting our decisions not to allow mining or any other so-called development projects in our ancestral land.”

Consunji-owned Silvicultural Industries (SII) and San Miguel Corporation have been encroaching on the T’bolis’ ancestral domain for many years.

SII operates the Dawang Coffee Plantation by virtue of its Industrial Forest Management Agreement (IFMA).

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) has awarded the IFMA in 1992. It will expire on 2016.

Another Consunji owned company has recently started drilling activities for coal mining within the ancestral territory of the T’bolis.

As tension builds up because of harassments from the company guards, Danyan decried the government’s failure to act on their behalf.

“This government is ramming their version of development into our throat despite our opposition, this is already too much” he said.

“It seems that the government finds it difficult to respect the decision of the community not to allow the Consunjis and San Miguel Corporation to mine their ancestral domains,” said Sister Susan Bolanio, OND of HESED Foundation.

The indigenous advocates called on the Aquino government to respect the decision of TAMASCO.

“For the T’bolis the coal mining projects are unacceptable and detrimental to their lives and livelihoods. We are saddened by the fact that the government is quick at fast tracking large-scale extractive projects but [slow in] attending to the needs of the indigenous peoples,” said Rosalinda Latonio of LRC-KsK/FoE Phils.

Danyan lamented that “for 18 years, we have been respectful of various government programs like appropriating our ancestral lands into an Agrarian Reform area despite our objection.”

He said their community allowed the lands to be appropriated for agrarian reform despite their objection “just so we may have peace in our ancestral territories.”

“But the government through its agencies, the DENR and NCIP, has allowed Consunji to incessantly intrude in our lands,” he lamented.

The tribal leader said 18 years of waiting is too long, but this time, he hopes the new administration will make the necessary interventions. (CBCPNews)