Appellate court denies Apo Land's damage claims against Naga government

The Court of Appeals-Cebu City recently upheld the decision of the Regional Trial Court-branch 8 denying a quarrying firm's claim for damages and preliminary injunction against the Naga municipal government.

Naga officials in 2001 ordered the Apo Land and Quarrying Corporation to stop its quarrying operation in barangay Pangdan because it resulted in a landslide that destroyed part of a school there already.

Naga officials led by the late mayor, Ferdinand Chiong, and now Mayor Valdemar Chiong, also found out that there was no environmental compliance certificate to cover the firm's operations there.

This prompted the firm to sue the Naga government for damages insisting that it has a mineral production sharing agreement that allowed it to do quarrying operations in almost every available area in that town.

The RTC however denied the firm's argument saying that the agreement's document did not include barangay Pangdan. The firm moved for reconsideration but was denied again, causing it to elevate the case to the appellate court.

CA associate justice Pampio Abarintos, in his ruling, stated that the ECC granted to Apo by the environmental management bureau in 1991 and the certification issued by the Mines and Geo-Sciences Bureau covered operations in barangays Tinaan and Inoburan only.

Abarintos said there was no question that Pangdan is included in the area certified as among the geographical coordinates by EMB but the certification did not mention that the firm did not need anymore a new ECC for its expansion project in Pangdan.

An ECC by definition certifies that the proposed project or undertaking will not cause negative impact against the government. "Even for just the expansion of an existing project, a new ECC is required... pursuant to a DENR's administrative order," Abarintos said.

"Seeing no grave of abuse on the part of the (RTC) when it denied (Apo) motion for reconsideration, the petition for certiorari is denied for lack of merit," the CA declared. - Ferliza C. Contratista