Clark Officials Hiding Truth About New Dangers
of Toxic Wastes?
The Clark Development Corporation (CDC) is
determined to build a special economic zone to attract more foreign investments
into the country. Yet as determined as the CDC officials are is a group of
Filipino scientists who believe that the Clark technocrats are withholding the
truth about the extent of toxic waste contamination. An environmental
fact-finding mission with some 30 scientists, doctors and environmentalists has
been denied permit by CDC officials since April. But the environmental
investigators are not giving up and they sought the help of Bulatlat.com about
their mission.
BY ZELDA DELA TRINIDAD SORIANO
Bulatlat.com
The Clark
Development Corporation (CDC) has been accused by Filipino scientists of
concealing from the public the worsening toxic waste contamination in the former
United States air force base in Pampanga north of Manila.
In a statement last
week, the scientists belonging to the Samahan ng Nagtataguyod ng Agham at
Teknolohiya para sa Sambayanan (Agham or Movement for the Advancement of Science
and Technology for the People) said that toxic wastes abandoned by the US air
force must have found their way into the soil and underground waterways of
Angeles and Mabalacat. Such seepage is endangering not only the ecosystem and
people living inside the fenced Clark but the more populated cities and towns
surrounding the former base.
After several
decades of operation, American forces vacated Clark airbase in 1992 or a year
after the Philippine Senate junked the proposed bases renewal treaty between the
two countries.
In recent years,
about 100 mysterious deaths and 500 other cases of physical abnormalities and
illnesses among folks who have lived inside Clark have been attributed to the
toxic waste contamination. Clark and the former Subic naval base in Olongapo
City were declared “calamity areas” by the Philippine Senate.
But CDC dismisses
the possibility of a worsening scenario and plans to clean up a landfill site in
the area as it prepares to fully convert the former airbase into a special
economic zone.
Denied entry
If such is the case,
Agham said, why the apparent refusal of CDC authorities to be transparent?
The group complains
that its environmental investigative mission, organized jointly with the NGO
Center for Environmental Concerns (CEC) and the environmentalist network
Kalikasan with some 30 scientists, has been repeatedly denied entry by CDC to
the Clark premises since April. The mission is supposed to conduct an ocular
inspection of the whole Clark, study the natural water system and river flow,
observe plant growth, collect water and soil samples to be capped by an
epidemiological study. The results are expected to correlate the numerous health
hazards recorded earlier by various concerned groups to the presence of toxic
chemicals and heavy metals in Clark.
Delilah Padilla,
Agham secretary general, said in an interview: “We’ve been told by CDC
officials to confine our study outside the guarded CDC premises.” She added,
“CDC is withholding critical information from the public by denying our entry
to Clark because we could prove that the contamination may be more severe and
extensive than what has been earlier documented and publicly known.”
“The issue is
being buried because Clark is being packaged as a special economic zone and CDC
will convert the use of about 443.48 hectares of prime agricultural lands into a
commercial, industrial and logistics area in the next five years,” Padilla
said.
But the industrial
plan will precisely compromise the lives and welfare of the people, warned
Padilla.
Clean-up
Juan Miguel Fuentes,
manager of the CDC Environmental Planning and Management Department, revealed
recently a plan to clean up the contaminated sites in Clark. A German company is
being tapped to secure a grant from the European Union for the clean up of the
landfill near Mabalacat town inside the present Clark Special Economic Zone.
The said landfill
“is very near the perimeter wall that prevents intrusion into the former US
military base,” Fuentes said. Some chemicals could seep into the ground and
contaminate the water supply in these areas east of the base, following the
natural downstream flow of water in that direction, he admitted.
But Padilla believes
Fuentes is not telling the whole story.
“He (Fuentes)
creates an impression that the contamination of water supply in Mabalacat,
Barangay Dau and nearby Brgy. Balibago in Angeles City was mainly due to the
contaminants such as phosphates sodium compounds and fertilizer chemicals from a
landfill used by the Americans near the Mabalacat gate,” she said. “We, from
Agham, are confident to argue that Mr. Fuentes is wrong and the issue of water
contamination in Clark cannot be attributed solely to the Mabalacat landfill.”
In a statement,
Agham cites the Weston International study that identified, as early as in 1996,
about 14 contaminated sites. The study pointed to the Decommissioned Power
Plant, the hospital transformer site, Wagner Aviation transformer site and the
California Bus Line which replaced the former Asbestos Landfill site, as
“potentially high risk areas” inside Clark compared to the Mabalacat
landfill which was categorized by the Weston study only as “medium risk
site.”
Toxicity path
Agham also insists
that the toxic and hazardous wastes contained in these sites are not just simple
organic pollutants but lethal toxic compounds such as polychlorinated byphenyls
(PCBs), benzene, toluene, ethyl and zylene, polyaromatic hydrocarbon and total
petroleum hydrocarbon.
The Agham statement
argues: “Gauging the topographical and drainage patterns of Clark (Mabalacat
area being the lowest at 90 degrees above sea level as compared to Angeles City
at approximately 110 degrees ASL and with a homogenous groundwater aquifer
moving towards its base), severe impact areas are most likely to fall within the
tri-boundary of the municipalities of Mabalacat, Magalang and Angeles City.
These areas are particularly subjected to lateral, vertical as well as air-borne
dispersal of contaminants through natural and human pathways. Therefore, this
could mean a larger potential damage not just on the water supply in Mabalacat
town proper, Brgy. Dau and in nearby Balibago in Angeles City but of the
immediate ecosystems and the lives of more people.”
Confirmed
Looking back, the
presence of toxic waste contamination within the former US military base is
confirmed by nine independent studies conducted by different foreign and local
groups since 1986. Health hazards linked to the said contamination have been
recorded in six health studies.
All these
environmental and health studies were verified and cited in Senate Resolutions
162, 172, 303, 587, 281, 460 and 567 pushing for an “Investigation in aid of
legislation for the presence of hazardous toxic waste in former US military
bases in Subic and Clark.” The resolutions also call for the government to
declare the former military bases a “calamity area.” Bulatlat.com
We want to know what you think of this article.