DOTC told: Answer petition to stop P19-B Sasa project

By Cheneen R. Capon
The Supreme Court has given the Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC) 10 days to comment on the urgent petition for writ of Kalikasan with prayer for Temporary Environmental Protection Order (TEPO) filed against the P18.9-billion Davao Sasa port modernization project.
Lawyer Harry Roque, counsel of the petitioners, told EDGE Davao that the DOTC has not made its counter affidavit since the case was heard on Tuesday last week.
The petitioners of the case, which was filed last March 14, are Davao City Councilor Diosdado Mahipus Sr., former councilor Pilar Braga, representing the consumer sector, former councilor Antonio Vergara, urban poor representative Benjie Badal, and the Samal City Resort Owners Association, Inc. (SCROA).
The 26-page petition asked the Supreme Court to issue a writ of continuing mandamus and Writ of Kalikasan with prayer for TEPO before the Supreme Court last March 14.
The SC is now considering the petition which seeks to stop the Sasa port bidding by issuing a Writ of Kalikasan for the failure of the national government to seek the consent of the people and for not complying with environmental laws.
Roque said he is optimistic that the highest tribunal will rule in favor of the petitioners.
“There is an obvious violation of the Local Government Code and the Environment Code,” Roque said, adding that the petitioners are using the decision of the Supreme Court on the case between Boracay Foundation, Inc. against Philippine Reclamation Authority and the provincial government of Aklan in 2011 as its argument.
In this case, he said the Supreme Court issued a permanent environmental protection order not just a TEPO because of the noncompliance to the Local Government Code and Environmental Code as the barangay government did not give their consent to the project.
Roque believes that the court will also apply the same decision on the Davao Sasa Modernization Project.
The enactment of the writ of Kalikasan “is a commitment that the court will use judicial power in order to protect the environment and promote the right of the people to healthy ecology.”
Earlier, petitioners together with other concerned citizens of Davao City and stakeholders in some parts of the Davao Region wrote a letter to the four remaining bidders to withdraw their bids and join the bandwagon calling for the review of the project.
“We ask you to withdraw your bids and join our call for the review of this project and let the next administration to pursue it,” the oppositors said.
The critics said the port development project “has wrong premises, design and cost and therefore not responsive to the needs of the port users of the Davao region. It has not also undergone the correct and transparent bidding procedures and processes.”
The four bidders, the oppositors said, will have to consider the “two huge obstacles” of the project which is, firstly, the objection of the city government of Davao. “No less than the elected City Council of Davao issued a resolution of to this effect last December 21, 2015.”
Secondly, the group said an urgent case was filed before the Supreme Court last month for the project which the group described as “white elephant and subject of a troublesome litigation.”
“It is a petition to stop this bidding by invoking the Writ of Kalikasan for the failure of the national government to seek the consent of the people and for not complying with environmental laws.”
The group said the “national government must be hiding these issues” from the interested port developers which will eventually become “unnecessary problems”.
“Hence, we appeal to your sense of fairness and justice. We are afraid you will eventually be holding the proverbial empty bag if you pursue this bid,” the letter read.