Lafayette pays P10.4-M fine, readies test-run of polymetallic project

Lafayette Phils. is completing additional pollution safeguards imposed by the government and paid last Tuesday a P10.4-million fine for two mine incidents in October preparatory to testing its processing facilities and eventually its resumption of operations.

Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Angelo Reyes ordered the payment and the new safeguards as conditions before the test run, which would involve only water initially to allow the company’s technicians to check the system for leaks and further fine-tuning.

The new management of Lafayette under Carlos Dominguez had spent about P400 million for these remedial measures since taking over last January to show that the company would operate with the full assurance of environmental and health protection.

Dominguez, adopting full transparency in regaining the public’s trust in the company, had given his word that Lafayette would resume operations only after its systems and facilities pass all tests.

In turn, the host communities of Albay and Sorsogon, both from the public and private sectors, had given their overwhelming support for the restart.

At full operations, the company is expected to directly hire 900 people, most of them from the host communities.

As revenues come in after a lull since November, the company said it will launch a series of projects that will directly benefit these communities, with education, livelihood, and environmental protection as priorities, including P31 million worth of social development projects.

In its decision, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources noted that aside from creating jobs, the project would also pay the government P3 billion in taxes, of which P244 million would go to local governments.

Reyes said that allowing the project to resume operations would ensure the full remediation and rehabilitation of the mine site after the project is terminated in about seven years.

"An abandoned open pit mine is not an attractive proposition as it will simply cause small miners to descend on the area and they will operate without environmental safeguards and safety measures," he said.

"In this case, the government, and ultimately the Filipino taxpayer will have to shoulder the considerable cost of remediation and rehabilitation. Allowing Lafayette to resume operations will allow an ECC-consistent mine rehabilitation and decommissioning plan to be implemented," he added.