Miners honor decorated safety engineer

MANILA, Philippines - Filipino miners recently paid tribute to a decorated safety engineer who saved a lot of disaster victims in the country.

In his eulogy to engineer Joel Son last April 2 in Padcal, Tuba, Benguet, engineer Louie Sarmiento, Ang Minero party head and president of the Philippine Mine Safety and Environment Association, said Son’s passing is a big loss to the mining industry but his example and sterling qualities will “forever be in the hearts of Filipino miners — their relatives and friends.”

“When we received news that Son’s condition became critical, we prayed and hoped that he would recover. He was not only a simple miner but a model mining engineer, an outstanding safety manager, a rescuer and, most of all, a hero to the many people whom he saved and helped,” Sarmiento said. 

Son led in rescuing disaster victims in Real, Quezon in 2004, in Guinsaugon and St. Bernard in Leyte in 2006, and in Mt. Diwalwal and Pantukan in Compostela Valley. He saved a number of people trapped by a landslide in Kias and Cresencia Village, Bokawkan Road in Baguio City, and at the Little Kibungan in Puguis, La Trinidad during typhoon “Pepeng” in 2009. 

Speaking on behalf of the Ang Minero party, Sarmiento said the late Philex Mining safety engineer was also credited with saving the lives of people trapped in the July 16, 1990 earthquake that flattened hotels and houses in Baguio City.

Son also led the search for the survivors of the ill-fated presidential helicopter that crashed in Tinoc, Ifugao in 2009 and finding a group of treasure hunters who were missing in Mayantoc, Tarlac.  

Sarmiento said he worked with Son for many years to promote safety consciousness among miners not only in Padcal, Benguet but also among the small-scale miners in the Surigao provinces and in Mt. Diwalwal and Pantukan in Compostela Valley. This is one of the goals of the Ang Minero party that hopes to have a solid voice in Congress in the coming elections.

“Ang Minero aims to unify and strengthen the minerals sector to counter attacks from environmental and anti-mining groups by having adequate representation in Congress. We are prone to attacks from various sectors because we are fragmented and we allow them to continue to divide the large-scale and small-scale mining groups,” he said.  

“We sometimes fail to account that there are thousands of workers, suppliers, contractors, professional organizations, students, indigenous peoples and families from host mining communities who stand to lose economic and social development opportunities if we just let the anti-mining debates continue in Congress,” Sarmiento added.  

Based on the records of the Department of Labor and Employment and the Mines and Geosciences Bureau, the mining and quarry sector employs about 250,000 workers. 

“If we can fully harness that workforce to vote for Ang Minero and if we multiply that number by at least four times to include the allied and downstream industries that alone would be a significant number of votes for Ang Minero,” Sarmiento said.