The Department of Energy (DOE) is conducting surveys for possible native hydrogen exploration in, among others, the province of Zambales. An Indigenous Peoples (IP) group in the area has voiced concerns and asked that no such surveys be conducted in the coastal waters of Zambales. They claim that it is part of their ancestral domain for having been their traditional fishing waters, although no formal delineation has yet to be done. A DOE official is concerned that the water claim may jeopardize the hydrogen exploration project and the existing petroleum service contracts off the coast of Zambales. He opines that the claim over the coastal waters as ancestral domain is doubtful as Republic Act No. 8371 is primarily concerned with land areas. To address this, he proposes that the DOE negotiate with the IP group for the latter to limit their ancestral domain claim to land areas only and DOE, in turn, will not conduct the surveys in the coastal waters. Is the opinion of the DOE official on the water claim and negotiation tenable? Explain.
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Answer: No, the opinion of the DOE official is untenable. Legal Basis: Under Republic Act No. 8371 (IPRA), ancestral domains explicitly include not only lands, but also inland waters, coastal areas, and natural resources possessed by Indigenous Cultural Communities/Indigenous
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Is the opinion and proposal of the DOE official tenable?
Under Section 3(a) of Republic Act No. 8371 (IPRA) and Cruz v. Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources, ancestral domains are not limited to terrestrial lands but explicitly encompass inland waters, coastal areas, and natural resources held under a claim of ownership since time immemorial. Furthermore, formal delineation is merely confirmatory of pre-existing native title, not constitutive of it. Because ancestral domains belong to ICCs/IPs communally in trust for present and future generations, ancestral domain rights over coastal waters cannot be validly surrendered or negotiated away through an administrative compromise.