Villagers push for demolition of cell towers
Wednesday, July 22, 2015
OFFICIALS and residents of Barangay Apas, Cebu City asked Mayor Michael Rama to order the demolition of cellular sites of two telecommunication companies in Sitio Calvary Hills.
They pointed out that the two-month grace period given by the City Council for Globe Telecom Inc. and Digitel Mobile Philippines Inc. to remove the cellular towers will lapse on July 27.
Barangay officials and residents were represented by village chief Ramil Ayuman, who wrote Rama a letter. In the letter, Ayuman cited the May 27 City Council resolution that gave Globe Telecom and Digitel Mobile, which operates Sun Cellular, two months to dismantle their mobile communications facilities.
The resolution revoked the special permit issued to Globe and Sun following the complaint of some residents at Sitio Calvary Hills.
The Calvary Hills Apas Residents’ Organization (Charo) said that since 2000, 25 neighbors have died of cancer. Five residents died last year.
In a separate letter to the mayor, Charo president Porponio Lapa Jr. said that the demolition order be enforced to “spare them (residents) from mental anguish.”
Globe chief legal counsel Froilan Castelo earlier said that cell sites as cause of cancer is “largely urban myth.”
Dr. Agnette Peralta, head of the Bureau of Health Devices and Technology of the Department of Health, said that international studies have not found conclusive evidence to show that exposure to radio frequency radiation, such as those from cellular sites, can cause cancer.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on July 23, 2015.
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