Under the fertile farmland and forests of southern Mindanao sits what may be one of the biggest copper deposits in South-east Asia. But whether the owners of the Tampakan Copper-Gold Project should be permitted to tap the mineral lode is under question.

Sagittarius Mines, Inc. (SMI) of the Philippines, along with the project's controlling and managing investor, Australian-based Xstrata Copper (a subsidiary of the Swiss-British giant Xstrata Plc) and Indophil Resources NL, also of Australia, have been prospecting for both copper and gold in the hinterlands of South Cotobato, Davao del Sur and Sultan Kudarat provinces.

While SMI has yet to divulge the method of extraction to be used, company spokesperson Roy Antonio says "it seems likely that open pit mining is the more viable option because the deposit is close to the surface’’.

SMI/Xstrata has poured millions of dollars into education, health care and the construction of community buildings to strengthen working relationships with the local governments and residents. The money has also succeeded in enticing tribal leaders to support the project.

But recent opposition to mining has come in the form of increased environmental awareness and activism, a New Year's Day attack on company property by the Communist New People's Army (NPA) and pending legislation in the Provincial Board of South Cotobato that may ban large-scale open pit mining.

Joe Madanguit, chair of the Board's Committee on Environmental Protection and Natural Resources, says that they are "not against mining per se," but feel that large-scale open pit mining should not be allowed in the environmentally-sensitive areas where SMI is exploring, which is a watershed for the region and is inhabited by the indigenous B'laan people.

Madanguit spoke shortly after a Feb. 6 meeting with SMI where Mines and Geosciences Bureau regional director Constancio Paye Jr. urged them to omit the open pit ban from their environmental code. Madanguit also says that the Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources Lito Atienza has warned local leaders not to impede President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's "revitalization of mining in the Philippines," which adheres to the controversial Mining Act of 1995. The Act permits mining firms to be 100 percent foreign-owned, allows repatriation of all profits and allocates Filipino tax money to reimburse corporations for their contributions to the community.

Roy Antonio states that the Mining Act "allows open pit mining, although there are particular procedures that should be followed pursuant to this type of mining activity." Madanguit argues that "the national law is so general, each province and city has particular peculiarities that only we are knowledgable on how to protect and preserve. The national law says we should bulldoze a mountain because it has gold under it even if it kills us’’.

The Philippine constitution provides for local government units to protect their environment and community, and Madanguit stresses that the Board cannot wait for SMI to publically announce what method of extraction they will use for them to prepare their environmental code.

SMI/Xstrata says it is committed to environmentally responsible mining and developing a sustainable economy, and has convinced influential B'laan leaders to back the project, though according to Father Roming Catedral of the Diocese of Marbel's Social Action Center, the government's National Commission on Indigenous People has a policy of installing pro-mining tribal leaders, and because "people are poor and some members of their families work for the mining company, they will address their basic needs first." But Catedral is hopeful that they can stop the Tampakan Project because "people will rise up from the grassroots level" as "people are aware of the effects of large-scale mining’’.

The diminished support for the mining corporation is reiterated by Tampakan's acting Vice-Mayor Relly Leysa. "The company didn't win the hearts and minds of the people," he says. "They won the 'pockets' of the tribal leaders."

The disatisfaction of some SMI employees erupted in a labour dispute over their continued status as temporary, "rotational" workers, and in October 2007 they revolted by padlocking SMI's buildings and setting up barricades on company grounds.

More trouble came to the Tampakan Project when approximately 50 NPA staged an assualt on Jan.1. The insurgents stole the firearms of the SMI security guards, abducted a militiaman and torched company structures, inflicting as much as 300,000 US dollars in damages. Subsequently, SMI announced plans to upgrade their security and the army deployed reinforcements to the area to pursue the rebels.

The increase in security forces worries some like Eliezer Billanes, Chair of the SOCCSKSARGENDS Alliance for Genuine Development, since he says "the more you militarise an area, the more human rights violations will occur."

Billanes is also afraid that the copper-gold mine might contaminate the Liguasan Marsh region, where a large number of Muslim communities have farms, and endanger the delicate ceasefire between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. It is also a fear shared by several members of the South Cotobato Chamber of Commerce and Industry Foundation, even though the Chamber's president has supported the mining project.

The Provincial Board has set a target date for the end of March to pass an environmental code and a possible ban on open pit mining. But the Macapagal-Arroyo regime "is manipulating different government agencies to toe her line," says Catedral,’’ and even bypass laws. Who suffers the most is the poor people in the mountains where the government will extract resources--the indigenous people. Where will they relocate people?" he asks. "How are they going to sustain them?"

"The problems are just beginning," says Catedral. Besides SMI/Xstrata, 48 other companies have filed 64 mining applications in Central Mindanao, 13 of them in the province of South Cotobato.Inter Press Service