Illegal miners source of fake e-mails

The country is at present agog over the fake e-mails that were received recently by top government officials, including President Aquino, Cabinet members, senators and congressmen, government agencies and media. The fake e-mails are supposedly printouts of an exchange of electronic communications between executives of TVI Resource Development  (Phils.) Inc. (TVIRD) and other personalities allegedly plotting and executing a “PLAN-X” to murder certain personalities opposing the company’s gold mining activities in Balabag, Zamboanga del Sur. These personalities are known small-scale miners, including incumbent local officials and even a Pagadian-based journalist.

The same fake e-mails were used as evidence in a petition for the issuance of a writ of amparo filed by the supposed targets of the alleged murder conspiracy contained in the purported electronic communications.

However, separate investigations by the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and by Pacific Strategies and Assessments (PSA), an independent international security and risk analysis company, found that the e-mail printouts are bogus.

Both the NBI and PSA noted defects in the e-mails that made them doubt their authenticity.

Both agencies stated with certainty in their respective reports that the standard word processing program MS Word was used in creating the communications and even attachments. The NBI also stated that the e-mail printouts “did not come from the authentic source (TVI) and are maliciously created.” For its part, the PSA stated in its June 14, 2012 Certification of Examination that the “Suspect documents are fraudulent and deliberately mislead the reader into believing they originated from TVI.

“A number of the ‘Suspect Documents’ were copies of actual TVI e-mails that had been fraudulently amended from their original text,” PSA said. “None of these ‘Suspect Documents’ were generated or distributed from within the (TVIRD) IT systems.”

Those who are not computer-literate may not understand the technical jargon, but the long and short of it is that fake e-mails were created and circulated to deceive their recipients into believing that there is a plot to assassinate certain personalities opposed to the TVIRD mining operations in Balabag.

It’s not just that fake e-mails were created; worse, their circulation has caused major damage to the reputation and operations of TVIRD, a very high price for TVIRD considering that it operates in a highly regulated industry. And while subsequently proven false, the spurious documents have done initial damage by subjecting TVIRD to endless hours of investigations and stalled business operations.

After failing to turn the executive branch to their side, the perpetrators then spread the spurious e-mail printouts to the halls of Congress. Finally, in the perpetrators’ latest move, persons named as targets of assassination in the fake e-mails filed a petition for a writ of amparo—an order for protection of the court—with the Court of Appeals’ branch in Cagayan de Oro City. The spurious documents are the main evidence of the supposed murder conspiracy against the petitioners. The implications of these fake e-mails are serious. Aside from the fact that these documents could mean jail time for those alleged to be part of the alleged murder conspiracy, they also cast serious doubt on the viability of the Philippines as a foreign business and investment haven.

But who are the perpetrators of these fake e-mails and what do they have to gain?

The top suspects are illegal miners—not the small-scale miners, but a syndicate of wealthy illegal miners who want to oust the legal TVIRD operation and have for themselves the mineral-rich area. They are not the small-scale miners with picks and shovels laboring to extract a few ounces of gold from the earth so they can sustain their hand-to-mouth existence. Rather, they are the big-time multimillionaire miners—well-funded, well-organized, and well-equipped—who operate with impunity, without following mining rules and regulations.

These illegal miners are those who cut trees for the wood needed to put up the illegal structures in their unsafe mines. They use the poor, small-scale miners, their wives and children, and expose them to unsafe conditions for less than minimum wages. They are the ones who bring in and use illegal and harmful substances such as cyanide and mercury, poisoning the water supply and the whole environment.

These illegal miners are behind environment advocates and community activists, pretending to support their causes for a clean, healthy environment and the protection of the poor and indigenous peoples. A small price to pay for billions of dollars in profit.

Finally, they are the ones who smuggle the extracted gold to parts unknown, hiding it from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas  which is mandated by law to buy all the gold extracted in the Philippines. Neither do they pay taxes to the government. They do, however, pay bribes to national, local, military and police officials and even rebel groups for their protection and continued operations. They also pay “special operations” groups to create spurious documents and fake e-mails. They are economic saboteurs.

They operated in Diwalwal, now they are operating in Balabag.