Bikol Green Group Dares Politicians to Clean up of Campaign Materials

Legazpi City (22 April) -- Fresh from the successful "Regional Forum on Environmental Concerns" which set the Bicol Environmental Agenda, the PANGATAMAN-Bikol (Bicol Center for Environmental Protection) challenged both local and national candidates to start cleaning-up their campaign materials beginning tomorrow in commemoration of Earth Day.

According to Professor Joel Batanes, president of the Board of Trustees of PANGATAMAN-Bikol, "in deference to Mother Earth we are calling on all candidates to start cleaning up their campaign paraphernalia today so that we will have less trash. Politicians should stop just paying lip service to the environment and in combating climate change but they should combine this with concrete action,"

"If [these candidates] really think that they are the best for the government post they are running for then let their platforms, programs and advocacies speak for themselves and not rely on drowning the country with their propaganda materials from tarpaulins, plastics posters to flyers and cardboards," added the environmental advocate.

"There [are] already tons of campaign material garbage collected since the start of the campaign period and the least we can do with them is to recycle these materials. We hope that this type of campaign and election would stop because it is aggravating the already grave state of the Earth. We should work hard so that the elections starting in 2013 and 2016 would be more environmental friendly," ended Batanes.