Fast Track Contract

Fast-track mining contracts in Palawan, backed by the Armed Forces of the Phillipines, may be illegal, but they are also indicative of the underlying reality obscured by UN biosphere designations, human rights declarations, and conventions on biodiversity. While these international moral sanctions and expressions of environmental sanity are right and proper, they are inadequate in and of themselves to achieve their intent.

It may seem trite to repeat that no movement can succeed without organizing, commitment and sacrifice, many NGOs — insulated from the lives lived by indigenous peoples on the front line of World War Four — fail to understand that self-defense is a necessary element of self-determination. Protest and civil disobedience are important preliminaries, as are network and communications development, but when institutional and market forces decide to attack tribal peoples engaged in protecting their resources, violence is inevitable.

At that point, the only remaining questions are what side you are on, and what you are willing to do.