Words. In the January 10 inquirer column of Conrado De Quiros, he praised the recent statement of the cregy of Quezon, or the Prelature of Infanta (where Aurora is included) indicting the Government for the deaths in Quezon last December. The church statement was in reaction to the words, some of them coming from government officials, that the disaster was caused by nature.
" By speaking out against the crime, the prelature corrects yet another word that has been so widely bandied about, whose effect is to bury the dead in the mud twice over. That is the word "illegal," especially as affixed to "logging." By harping on "illegal" logging, government has exculpated, or tried mightily to, the true criminals in this case, which are the legal loggers, made so by the documents they carry from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. Can anything be more idiotic than attributing the tons of logs that fell down the mountains and washed up to the sea to the nefarious activities of "illegal" loggers? Can anything be more idiotic than suggesting that the solution to that is to add more checkpoints to catch the “kainginero” [slash-and-burn farmers] and indigenous folk who operate on the fringes of the logging routes -- and often feed on them-and punish them "to the full extent of the law"?"
Wednesday, January 12, 2005
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
You're right! But the real culprits are some people in DENR (most of them had retired already) who have issued permits in exchange for ill-gotten wealths. Their wealth, hidden or not should be investigated. However, it's only fair to persecute everyone who are found to be doing livelihood business such as legal or illegal logging, kaingin or such, if that will cause harm and tragedy to the community.
Post a Comment