Provincial officials of Palawan were appealing to the national government to recognize the province’s rights for share from the Galoc oil field located in Northern Palawan.

During the Provincial Board’s 68^th regular session Dec. 2, Vice-Gov. David Ponce de Leon expressed hopes that the national government would recognize the oil field as being inside the territorial jurisdiction of Palawan.

”The Galoc oil field is within the territorial jurisdiction of Palawan and thus, the province is entitled to become a direct financial beneficiary of the exploitation and utilization of the said national wealth,” Ponce de Leon stated during the Board’s privilege hour.

Galoc was named after the Galoc Island in northern Palawan and is located 53 kms from Busuanga and 51 kms from San Vicente. The oil produced from the oil field was dubbed as “Palawan Light.”

According to Ponce de Leon, Galoc is within the Palawan hydrocarbon basin stressing the provincial government’s claim over Galoc.

”It is not a whimsical claim, we have constitutional, legal and factual rights”, he added.

The Local Government Code provides that the province where natural gas deposits are located is entitled to a 40 percent share from the national wealth derived from oil production.

He noted the province is entitled to a 40-percent share from the national wealth based on the Constitution and Local Government Code.

GPC already sold 300, 000 barrels of crude oil to Petron Corp. in Bataan during the second week of November.

The Department of Energy (DOE), during Galoc Production Company’s (GPC) presentation to the Board, admitted that Palawan’s share from Galoc is still uncertain, stating that it has the “same setting as Malampaya.”

“I hope that this will not be like the Malampaya which we are still fighting for until now. Let’s hope that we will not need to count years or to have a new memorandum of agreement before Palaweños could benefit from this,” Board Member Leoncio Ola earlier said.

The Board already expressed its optimism that the Galoc matter would not be like the Malampaya which has a pending case in the Supreme Court filed by the Provincial Government after the national government declared it as located off Palawan.