Attempts to smuggle cyanide into Diwalwal mine site foiled

Small-scale miners in the Mt. Diwalwal gold-rush area in Monkayo, Compostela Valley may still be using sodium cyanide in their processing mills.

This, after authorities foiled two attempts to smuggle large volumes of the poisonous substance into the mining area which was recently placed under government control.

According to reports reaching the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) central office in Quezon City, Senior Superintendent Ricardo Quinto, chief of the police Task Force Diwalwal (TFD), had intercepted a total of five drums and two cartons of cyanide aboard vehicles entering the mining site. Small-scale miners allegedly tried to sneak in the chemical.

Because of this, Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Heherson Alvarez has instructed Constancio Paye Jr., team leader of the Technical Working Group for Diwalwal, to conduct tests on mine tailings being churned out by gold processing mills there to determine if they have cyanide content.

Cyanide and mercury used in the processing of gold are reportedly being smuggled from Indonesia through the country’s southern backdoor.

Cyanide is used to extract more gold with less wastage through the carbon-in-pulp (CIP) method, according to a discussion paper titled "Mercury Pollution Due to Small-Scale Gold Mining in the Philippines" by Danilo Israel and Jasminda Asirot, published by the Philippine Institute for Development.

At the peak of the gold rush in the early 1990s, there were some 2,000 mini-CIP plants operating in Diwalwal, it said.

The same paper noted that the mills’ unfettered dumping of mine tailings and cyanide into the water systems of Diwalwal have poisoned rivers and have destroyed several hectares of ricefields and other crops since the 1980s.

Further, it said the sodium cyanide used in CIP processing could easily kill people and fish when discharged into waterways. But despite its dangers, cyanide pollution from CIP processing has not been investigated.

"A probable reason is that unlike mercury, cyanide is biodegradable and eventually decomposes into carbon dioxide and ammonia, making it potentially less harmful over time," the paper said.

Until today, lowland farmers in Monkayo town have been complaining about the continued pollution of the Naboc River.

The DENR has approved the resumption of mining activities by small-scale miners in Diwalwal provided they do not use explosives in extracting ore from existing tunnels.

In another development, DENR mining engineers and geologists are nearly finished in surveying the site of a P50-million tailings dam in Barangay Mabatas, Monkayo.

The Bayarong dam will serve as a common mine tailings pool for miners’ cooperatives, which have been issued service contracts. Small-scale mining operations in Diwalwal had been unregulated since the past 20 years.

Paye said the dam covers 122 hectares and can hold up to 47 million cubic meters of mine tailings that will be decanted before they are released into waterways. The dam is expected to be built in two to three months.