THE Court of Appeals has declared null and void a mineral production sharing agreement granted by Environment Secretary Joselito Atienza to SR Metals, a mining firm owned by former Rep. Edgar Erice of Caloocan City.

Associate Justice Pampio Abarintos said SR Metals backed its MPSA applications with SR Metals, which operates in Tubay, Agusan del Norte.

The court ruling was based on the petition of Basiana Mining Exploration Corp., which was contesting the claim of SR Metals.

“There was clear violation of due process and the entire proceedings was railroaded and suited for the benefit of private respondent,” the court said in a decision dated Dec. 22, 2008. Associate Justices Edgardo Sundiam and Ramon Bato Jr. concurred with the ruling.

In its scrutiny of the application papers filed by BMEC and SR Metals, the appellate court found that the owners of SR Metals falsified their documents.

“A scrutiny of the applications for MPSA filed by petitioners and private respondents shows that they were both filed with the DENR, MGB-XIII, Surigao City on the same day, on July 31, 1997. The similarity does not end there. Both have the same application numbers—MPSA (XIII) 00014 [for BMEC] and APSA-000014-XIII [for SR Metals] and the application fee paid by the two applicants [P5,520] was the same,” Abarintos said.

“Amazingly, both were paid on July 31, 1997 and both were covered by the same receipt number—2817891. A further scrutiny of said applications would reveal that the application was verified on the 2nd day of June 1997whereas private respondents [BMEC] application was verified only on the 7th day of July 2006. To the detriment of BMEC, the SR Metals passed off BMEC’s application as its own,” the court said.

The court also said BMEC was not afforded by the Environment Department the opportunity to be heard on its protest on the MPSA that Atienza granted to SR Metals. It added that SR Metals’ MPSA application, which BMEC filed way back in 1997, was re-filed by SR Metals under its own name in 2007. Romie A. Evangelista