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Palawan's chainsaw Christmas tree tells a story

By Celeste Anna Formoso

December 13, 2017, 7:36 pm

PNNI para-enforcer Gilbert Padul looks up at the unique Christmas tree made up of 86 confiscated chainsaws in their office in Barangay Bancao-Bancao, Puerto Princesa City. ( Celeste Anna Formoso/PNA photo) 

 

PUERTO PRINCESA CITY, Palawan -- In an unobtrusive extent of Barangay Bancao-Bancao in this city, where almost every home and building structure remains green with grass and rich vegetation, a rare two-storey high Christmas tree stands waiting to be decked with indigenous kerosene lamps will come alive on December 19.

Standing more than 25-feet tall over rusting impounded tricycles and corroding fishing vessels used to transport illegally cut lumbers and logs, and other scrap metals, the Christmas tree is special as it is made up of 86 chainsaws out of nearly a thousand that were confiscated by the Palawan NGO Network, Inc. (PNNI) over a course of 10 years.

The seemingly petrifying installation, mounted on the ground and reinforced with safety braces, never fails to catch the eye of the passersby and pique their curiosity for the last ten years since it was put up.

And this is a good thing as the Christmas tree tells a story. 

“The chainsaws just got too many. They got so many, they were taking up so much space. Every year, we put up a Christmas tree made up of chainsaws and eventually, it got tedious to take down every January then put it up again every December,” said lawyer Bobby Chan, head of the PNNI, to the Philippines News Agency (PNA) Wednesday morning.

Chan said that at first, putting the giant chainsaw Christmas tree has no special reason except the fact that many are devout Catholics among the PNNI staff, who thought it was a great idea to save space.

“Eventually, it became the best information, education, and communications campaign material that we have in Palawan. It may not be perfect, it may not be a pretty picture to have but it’s the best storyteller of what goes on in our forest,” he said.

When people go to the PNNI office, which also serves as a “museum” of all confiscated items employed to abuse the environment, they always ask what the Christmas tree symbolizes.

Chan tells them: “It symbolizes a paradox that we are the last frontier and yet, illegal logging is unhampered in our forests.”

Even with the Chainsaw Act of 2002, which strictly prohibits the use of unregistered chainsaws, he said illegal logging in Palawan is still unstoppable.

“It’s not making a dent. Outside the city, there are around 3,000 chainsaws running loose. I only have a thousand, maybe  there are 2,000 more unregistered,” he added.

For Gilbert Padul, PNNI’s para-enforcer for the Taytay-El Nido-Linapacan area, seeing the Christmas tree made up of confiscated chainsaws spells “hope” for Palawan’s forests not only during Christmas time.

Because it is never taken down, and is always there all year-round, it continues to jog his memory that people in Palawan should be passionate in guarding their forests for the next generations to come.

“Ang simbolo niyan sa aking iyong tagumpay sa paghuli namin sa gubat sa mga nag-iillegal logging. Nasasayahan ako na nababawasan ang mga ginagamit nilang chainsaw para putulin ang mga puno at may pag-asa pa ang ating mga gubat (It symbolizes our triumph against those who were cutting trees illegally. It makes me feel happy that we’re able to diminish the numbers of chainsaws that they are using to cut trees and that there is hope for our forests),” Padul explained.

On December 19 at 5 p.m., the PNNI that was formed by mainstream NGOs and people’s organizations (PO) in the city and province will illuminate the chainsaw Christmas tree with native kerosene lamps in celebration of the Yuletide Season and another year of success of helping protect Palawan’s environment.

The event will also feature a press conference where the PNNI is expected to make a report about the state of Palawan’s environment. (PNA)

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