Cosalan clarifies law on miners' retirement age

By March L. Fianza

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet -- Contrary to what is now being spread in the mining camps by unscrupulous supporters of the opposite camp, former congressman Ronald "Ronnie" Cosalan claimed that it was he who pushed in congress the bill reducing the retirement age of underground mine workers from 60 to 50.

"It was a fulfillment of a promise I made to mine workers in consultations that were held before becoming their representative in congress," he clarified, referring to the "Underground Mine Workers Act" or R.A. 8558.

Despite the controversy generated in the process of its passage, Cosalan said he is happy for the law because in some way it frees the underground mine worker from his previous work condition.

The struggle to pass the bill was rough since there was understandable opposition from the management sector of the mining companies.

Their predicament was seen in the money they had to pay their retiring miners in accordance with law, and a "chaotic" re-balancing of their finances.

The more contentious issues raised in the committee discussion of the bill were the nature of underground mine work that was most strenuous and most dangerous to life and limb.

Work environment in the mining tunnels was health threatening too, as compared to other field work or blue collar jobs.

The youthful Cosalan said that records in the Batasan bear the best proof of every bill introduced in the House of Representatives of which he was a member from 1995 to 2001.

Passage of the law was supported in the upper chamber by senator Marcelo Fernan, the incumbent president of the senate then.

The concerned department under the executive branch should now be implementing its provisions since it was signed into a law nearly a decade ago, Cosalan said.

Another Cosalan bill that encountered rough sailing in congress was the ancestral lands and ancestral domain law. It was crafted in collaboration with Senator Juan Flavier. Today, several indigenous tribes are benefiting from the justice that the law provides.

Unfortunately however, politicians of vote-rich Baguio were opposed to its application in the city. In contrast to the records of the DENR then, they argued that there were no longer any ancestral lands left in the city.
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I really had a very bad stomach last week. I was never in that condition for the past five years or so but last week was different as it interfered in my decision on what to write about in this column. This is the result of that bad stomach ache.

The following are verses many PR "experts" unwittingly state or write in the course of their functions. Some are statements of spokesmen of the government's agencies, some are from private entities. Here goes.

"Smoking kills. If you're killed, you've lost a very important part of your life." -- anti-smoking campaign ad written on the poster of a health agency office.

"I've never had any major knee surgery on any other part of my body." -- said by a basketball idol who once became a public official.

"Aside from the killings, the Philippines has one of the lowest crime rates in Asia." -- Police general interviewed by the foreign press.

"We've got to pause and ask ourselves: How much clean air do we need" -- statement of an environment official during deliberations on the Clean Air Act in congress.

"Half this game is ninety percent mental." -- sports commentator

The word "genius" isn't applicable in football. A genius is a guy like Einstein." -- sports analyst.

"Most of Manila's imports come from overseas." -- Customs official talking to a Chinese businessman

"Your food ration will be stopped effective May 2007 because we received notice that you passed away. May God bless you. You may reapply if there is a change in your condition." -- letter notice sent to a social services client in Tondo from the PR man of a rich politician in Manila.

"If somebody has a bad heart, they can plug this jack in at night as they go to bed and it will monitor their heart throughout the night. And the next morning, when they wake up dead, there'll be a record." -- doctor instructing a group of nurses class=.