RESUMPTION OF TREE-CUTTING

LINGAYEN— The provincial government was not consulted by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) about the recent issuance of tree cutting permit for the 589 trees along the Manila North Road (MNR) in Pangasinan.

This became apparent after learning of the cutting of the trees on November 23 based on the permit issued by DENR to the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) on October 30 to cut the 589 trees within 45 days.

“Dapat ikonsulta muna sa komunidad, mga tao, at sa provincial government lahat ng nangyayari dito sa Pangasinan at makuha ang kabuuang sentimyento ng mga tao,” said Vice Governor Jose Ferdinand Calimlim Jr. in an interview last week.

Calimlim said the provincial board will discuss the failure of the DENR and DPWH to consult and coordinate with the provincial government and will submit its recommended course of action.

The provincial board had ratified Provincial Resolution No. 269-2014 expressing their opposition “to the cutting of trees along the national roads within the province, with intent to preserve as many trees as possible with stern warning to the DPWH (Department of Public Works and Highways) Third Pangasinan Engineering District not to cut any of the standing big trees, more or less 700…”

Meanwhile, Governor Amado Espino Jr. reiterated the provincial government’s stand that only dead and dying trees can be cut.

In his letter to the DPWH and DENR dated March 5, 2015, Espino wrote “We wish to make it clear that we are absolutely against the cutting of any more living and surviving trees along the Manila North Road, and we maintain the position that concerned government agencies, such as the DENR, should exert all means to treat and rehabilitate those previously girdled trees that have a good chance of survival.”

By interposing no objection to the cutting and removal of said dead trees, the DENR was required by the provincial board to certify that the trees to be cut are already dead and beyond revival.

Meanwhile, the Save the Trees Movement condemned the resumption of the tree-cutting along the MNR.

Virginia Pasalo, a commissioner of the Pangasinan Historical and Cultural Commission (PHCC) and a co-convenor of the movement, who became emotional in an interview, expressed her disgust over the DENR’s decision to issue said order.

“I think I would have to sue said agencies again,” she said.

Pasalo subsequently posted in her Facebook account: “Every page of DENR Secretary’s (Ramon Paje) career, is littered with murdered trees. If his biography is to be written, the pages will not be enough to contain the trees he has murdered. Truly the Secretary of the Destruction of the Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).”

“Secretary Paje, you are a murderer, not only of trees, but of the very ideal that your office has been vested upon. Pangasinan will remember you. You are the Jack the Ripper of our trees, ripping off our souls and spirits in the most cruel way, you have deprived us of our cultural memory,” she added.

Pasalo also vented her resentment on former 5th District Representative Mark Cojunagco, the known proponent of the cutting of trees along MNR.  “And you, Mr. Mark Cojuangco, whose cultural memory of Pangasinan is non-existent owing to the fact that you are not a son of this province (but of Tarlac), may the collective energy of the trees you worked hard to get killed haunt you….”  (Johanne R. Macob)

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