‘GIVE HELP DIRECTLY’

By HAZEL P. VILLA
Panay News, Sept. 22, 2006

NUEVA VALENCIA, Guimaras – Show that you really care. Deliver help directly.

Residents and an official of oil spill-affected villages here are requesting donors of relief goods to directly give their donations of cash and kind to the residents and evacuees themselves.

“It is better to give money and goods directly to the sitios and barangays. We appreciate that more,” said Ramon Ortiz, Sangguniang Bayan member here.

Editha Cayanan, 54, a shell gatherer in Brgy. Tando said “Ang relief naga-abot, pero indi mapuslan (the relief goods arrive but they are next to useless),” she said at the evacuation area of Tando on Thursday last week.

She said clothes that are in jute sacks to be distributed to residents and evacuees seemed like they have been pre-selected before distribution, claiming that she knew what real relief goods looked like since she has a sister dealing in ukay-ukay (used clothing for sale).

Rema Cagayan, 39, seconded the opinion of Cayanan, citing her appreciation for the couple from the Singapore Evangelical Church who arrived on September 7 and personally distributed one sack of rice, powdered milk and relief goods per house in Tando village that has 204 households and a population of more than a thousand.

Cagayan said that since Petron-chartered MT Solar 1 carrying 2.19 million liters of bunker fuel oil sank off southern Guimaras on August 11, she could remember three instances of receiving relief help.

On the third week of August, Cagayan said help came from Petron and Taos Puso Foundation that gave at least five kilos of rice and several canned goods.

The provincial Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) delivered help on the third week of August – distributing two kilos of rice, two packs of noodles and two canned goods to affected households in Tando.

The PDSWD came back on the first week of September again to distribute four and a half kilos of rice, four packs of noodles and canned goods.

Most donations are entrusted to the government’s Task Force Guimaras, the Red Cross or sent directly to the Guimaras Provincial Capitol in the capital town of Jordan.

There are two kinds of Guimarasnons affected by the oil spill, said Anna Maria “Lally” Nava, officer in charge of the Red Cross Guimaras Chapter.

The directly affected are those in the towns of Nueva Valencia, Sibunag and San Lorenzo with bunker fuel oil on their shores and mangroves and are daily receiving the brunt of the effects of environmental pollution.

The indirectly affected are those residing in the towns of Jordan and Buenavista that have no oil spill but have done away with fishing as a livelihood because there are no buyers of fish from Guimaras even though the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources said Guimaras fish are safe to eat.

The five towns of Guimaras have a total population of about 152,000, said the Provincial Economic Development Office.

“It must be considered that those indirectly affected by the oil spill also need help,” said Nava in a telephone interview Tuesday afternoon.

The Red Cross has donated to Guimaras province 600 boots, 1000 gloves and 1000 masks on top of being the conduit for donations from Iloilo City and other parts of the country, said Nava, wife of Jordan mayor Felipe Nava.

Promotion of Guimaras diving spots put on hold

For the full story, click 24 ORAS, Sept. 21, 2006.

(Site manager: Works on QuickTime or Windows Media Player)

DENR: 1,500 hectares of ecosystem damaged by Guimaras oil spill

By Katherine Adraneda
The Philippine Star 09/22/2006

THE sinking of the ill-fated M/T Solar I last month that resulted in the worst oil spill in Philippine history off Guimaras island has affected at least 1,500 hectares and various ecosystems in two provinces in the Visayas, including a marine reserve of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.

As this developed, the “Task Force Solar I Oil Spill” revealed in a report that there is “a continuing minimal rate of oil that comes out” of the sunken tanker owned by Sunshine Maritime Development Corp. (SMDC) and chartered by Petron Corp. to deliver two million liters of crude oil to Zamboanga City.

According to the report, 209 hectares of mangroves, 20 hectares of sea grass and 100 hectares of coral reefs within the 1,143.45-hectare Taklong Marina reservation in Nueva Valencia town was affected by the oil spill as of Sept. 19.

Outside the marine reserve, the report said, 171.16 hectares of mangroves, 42 hectares of seaweed and 367.29 hectares of fishpond were affected in Nueva Valencia alone.

The oil spill has also affected 257.02 hectares of mangroves and 16 hectares of seaweed in Sibunag town and 10.8 hectares of mangroves in San Lorenzo town, both in Guimaras province.

A total of 146 kilometers of coastline and 15.8 square kilometers of coral reefs were also contaminated in Nueva Valencia and 74 kilometers of coastline in Sibinag were affected by the oil spill.

The task force also delivered the latest damage report for the province of Iloilo: 10.34 kilometers of coastline in the town of Ajuy and 4.5 kilometers of the coastline in the town of Concepcion.

“Continuous surveillance, containment, recovery and cleanup operations are being undertaken by (task force) members,” the report said.

The cleanup efforts have covered a total area of 215.074 kilometers in Guimaras, yielding 1,633.73 metric tons of debris, the report said.

A total of 95,819 sacks of collected “dirty oil” debris from various affected barangays in Guimaras have been loaded on barges at the Cablangan Wharf.

Insurance payments for oil spill unsure

GOTCHA By Jarius Bondoc
The Philippine Star 09/22/2006

AFTER the rush cleanup of M/T Solar-1’s oil spill in Guimaras Strait, the next phase is long-term restoration of the damaged environment. But completely squeezing bunker oil from the white sand beaches, replanting mangrove patches, and replenishing coral reefs cost money. Starved for cash, the government is hoping that pollution insurance of the ship owner and charterer will bankroll the work. President Gloria Arroyo in fact has told owner Sunshine Maritime and charterer Petron Corp. to start collecting so they can also commence rehabilitation. Some local officials in despoiled Guimaras are even concocting epidemic outbreaks in the hope of partaking of P300 million that Petron reportedly expects to receive. Fishermen who were forced to stay ashore for weeks, seaside resort operators who suffered booking cancellations, and fruit plantation owners affected by the black muck are filing class suits.

They’re all in for a nasty surprise. For, the Special Board of Marine Inquiry has ruled that Sunshine and Petron violated basic safety rules and thus caused the tanker to capsize and sink. In which case, no insurer would likely pay for negligence or outright contract breaches.

Maritime industry insiders aver that insurers always investigate the cause of a ship sinking or pollution, and pay only if these were accidental. Safety breaches, however, are deemed intentional and not subject to recompense.

Among the findings is that the ship left Limay, Bataan, overloaded with 2.2 million liters of bunker oil. Its bottom, limited to only 4.9 meters below water surface, was submerged 5.2 meters, indicating by its storage capacity an overload of 150 tons. Solar-1 obviously and dangerously had lost buoyancy.

Compounding it was that shipmaster Norberto Aguro sailed in extremely rough southwest monsoon waters. From the crew’s account that they were buffeted by four-meter-high waves, investigators calculated that Solar-1 took in another 200 tons of water due to a leaky hull. All this caused the tanker to list on its right, then flip over and sink. The SBMI blamed all this on Petron.

Sunshine committed equally serious offenses. Already widely reported was that Aguro did not even have a license to command an oil tanker. What he had, which he and Sunshine president Clemente Cancio claimed to be far superior, was a license to run a chemical tanker. Assuming they were right, the captain was an expert in operating a huge truck but was driving an unfamiliar puny scooter.

Sunshine also had wangled from the Maritime Industry Authority a heavier deadweight capacity. This required the owner to compute new trims for stability, which it did not undertake and thus compromised Solar-1’s seaworthiness for any voyage, loaded or not.

After Solar-1’s last dry dock in February, Sunshine scrapped its safety inspection contract with a foreign firm, and moved it to the MARINA. The agency issued it an interim document of compliance (DOC) up to June 7, 2006 only. Sunshine then applied for a full audit only on June 13. Hence, the SBMI concluded: “Without a valid DOC, the company should temporarily cease its operation. However, despite non-compliance, the vessel continued its operations.” (Only when the spill and sinking were being investigated did authorities cancel the owner’s operating permits.)

There could be more basic reason for insurers to not pay. And it has nothing to do with the SBMI’s findings. Reports have it that Sunshine could not pay the P212,000-premium for Solar-1’s hull and machinery insurance. Naturally, Stronghold Insurance Company Inc. cancelled the P20-million policy. Premium must be paid for an insurance policy to take effect, SICI president Romulo de los Reyes reminded Sunshine of the obvious. To which Cancio could only sheepishly reply that “paying never used to be a problem until now.”

Another insurer based in Luxembourg also might refuse paying $301 million in accident coverage. Under policy clauses of the Shipowners’ Mutual Protection and Indemnity Association, Sunshine’s failure to check Aguro’s license is tantamount to negligence and bad faith, both grounds for nonpayment. The exclusion rule is clear: “There shall be no right of recovery of any claim from the Association if it arises out of willful misconduct on the part of the insured.”

In spite of his violation, Cancio is hopeful the Luxembourg group will pay up. It already has sent representatives to the affected island to assess the damage and instruct residents how to file claims. Still, all those do not mean it would release funds to cover Sunshine’s transgressions. As murky as the oil spill is the future of thousands of Guimaras villagers.

Barge carrying oil sludge departs Guimaras

ILOILO CITY – The barge that carries the first batch of oil sludge collected from the shorelines of Guimaras left Thursday as Malacañang reported that the sunken oil tanker continues to leak bunker oil.

Nueva Valencia Mayor Diosdado Gonzaga said “Carmen” left Thursday with 500 tons of oil sludge. It is set to arrive in Misamis Oriental on Saturday where the sludge will be hauled.

The barge will return to Guimaras as soon as the sludge is unloaded. Two more barges are on stand by in the island-province as there is still much oil sludge that needs to be collected. (Sunstar Iloilo, Sept. 22, 2006)

Oil siphoning timetable sought

BY CARLA GOMEZ
Visayan Daily Star
Sept. 21, 2006

PETRON must give a specific timetable for the siphoning out of the bunker fuel from the sunken MT Solar 1 off the coast of Guimaras, Negros Occidental Gov. Joseph Marañon said yesterday.

Jose Campos, Petron vice president for marketing, said in a letter to the governor earlier that “You can be assured that we will pursue the removal of the remaining oil with the Protection and Indemnity Club and the International Oil Pollution Compensation Fund. We will not rest until the environmental threat is eliminated.”

Marañon said while it was good to hear that Petron will pursue the removal of the fuel, he will write the firm again to ask that a definite timetable be set.

MT Solar 1 with 2.1 million liters of bunker fuel sank on Aug. 11 causing an oil spill that has hit the coasts of Guimaras and Iloilo.

Valladolid Mayor Ricardo Presbitero said that until the sunken fuel is removed, people of the coastal towns of Negros Occidental cannot let their guard down as they may also be hit by an oil spill from MT Solar 1.

The demand of the officials of Negros led by the governor is unconditional, Petron must remove the sunken bunker fuel immediately, he said.

“Until the threat is removed, our lives will not return to normal,” Presbitero said.

He said that President Arroyo visited Guimaras three times but the removal of the sunken fuel is still uncertain and the problems of those in Guimaras affected by the oil spill appear to be increasing.

He also said there is talk about a Petron PR fund to condition the minds of the people about the removal of the sunken fuel, but said this was based on speculation.

Meanwhile, he said Valladolid is continuing its preparations to ward off a possible oil spill.

“We will conduct our first oil spill drill on Friday but instead of participants gathering oil, they will be picking up garbage,” he said.

Health Regional Director Lydia Depra Ramos yesterday also stressed the need for Petron to remove the oil spill debris to reduce the threat on the health of the people.

She said that in Guimaras, from 20 to 45 patients a day are treated by DOH personnel for respiratory track infection, while the number of gastro intestinal cases are lower.

“As long as the oil spill debris remains, the people should be vigilant and follow DOH advisories,” she said.

She said those allowed to participate in the work on oil spill in Guimaras should only work five hours a day if they have the proper protective gear, and are between 20 to 50 years.

Senators pressed to pass oil spill bill

By Macon Ramos Araneta
Mla. Standard Today

CEBU Rep. Eduardo Gullas yesterday urged senators to act on the oil spill compensation bill which has been pending in the Senate for more than 10 months.

He said congressmen passed House Bill 4363 last November and it has been languishing in the Senate since.

The bill, he said, provides for the enforcement of all international rules on the accountability of ship owners for oil spill damage, and ensures instant and sufficient compensation for parties.

He said the bill incorporates as part of Philippine law the provisions of the 1992 International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage and the 1992 International Convention on the Establishment of the International Oil Pollution Compensation Fund.

Under the proposed Oil Pollution Compensation Act, owners of ships that “cause pollution, damage or create a grave and imminent threat of causing such damage” will be liable for expenses incurred in cleanup operations at sea or on shore, costs incurred for preventive measures, consequential loss of earnings suffered by owners or users of damaged property, economic losses, damage to human health and environmental damage.

(For the full story, click Oil spill bill, Sept. 22, 2006.)