‘Resolve case over open dump in Cabanatuan City’

Environmental advocates urged Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez yesterday to immediately resolve the case they filed a year ago against Cabanatuan City Mayor Julius Caesar Vergara for the continued operation of a four-story-high, 50-year-old open dumpsite in Barangay Valle Cruz.

Members of the Ecological Waste Coalition lamented that the case "has been gathering dust for over a year now."

"The Office of the Ombudsman should act now on the case and stop health and environmental hazards," said Romy Hidalgo, coordinator of the Eco Waste’s task force on dumps and landfills.

Eco Waste, an environmental network, gathered protesters from Nueva Ecija, Bulacan, Cavite, Rizal, and Metro Manila and picketed the Office of the Ombudsman yesterday to call Gutierrez’s attention to the case.

Residents claimed that the city government of Cabanatuan "has dismally failed to shut down the polluting dump" despite repeated closure deadlines against its operation since 2002.

"The illegal dumpsite continues to operate despite the residents’ appeals and mass actions and the cease-and-desist order issued to Mayor Vergara by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR)," Hidalgo said.

In July 2005, DENR Undersecretary Ramon Paje issued a cease-and-desist order to Vergara, but Environmental Management Bureau-Region 3 director Lormelyn Claudio reportedly failed to enforce it, the Eco Waste said.

The Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000 (Republic Act 9003) mandates the closure of open dumpsites on Feb. 16, 2004, and controlled dumpsites on Feb. 16, 2006.

According to Eco Waste, over 1,000 dumpsites across the country are contaminating the soil and water with hazardous leachate, and threatening to destroy agricultural lands, watersheds, forests and coastal areas.

It added that dumps also pollute the air with the continuous emission of greenhouse gases and persistent organic pollutants that pose public health and environmental hazards.