NEWSFLASH

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INDIGENOUS PEOPLE'S RIGHTS SCARING MINING INVESTORS

Manila, May 6, 1998 - A top mining executive warns that the confusion surrounding the conflicting provisions of the Mining Act of 1997 and the Indigenous People's Rights Act may drive away foreign mining investments.

Gerard Brimo, CEO of Philex Mining, told the Manila Times that unless the problems are immediately resolved, foreign mining ventures may just go to other rich mining sites such as Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Myanmar and Vietnam.

Last year saw the implementation of the IPRA, a more comprehensive law that secured the country's indigenous people's rights and welfare, particularly over the issue of exploitation of ancestral domain.

The bone of contention is the ancestral domain, where both the IPRA and the Mining Act specifically states that no mining operation can take place in an ancestral domain unless there is prior consent from the indigenous tribes of the area.

The provision has turned off a lost of investors, according to sources in the mining industry.

Brimo assailed the IPRA, saying the law cill also affect other industries such as marble and the construction sectors which rely heavily on the country's natural resources.

"The IPRA may just turn the whole country into an ancestral domain area," Brimo warned.

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