Section 253 of the same Code is hereby amended to read as follows: "SEC. 253. Occupation fee.
Section 2
SEC. 2. Section 253 of the same Code is hereby amended to read as follows: "SEC. 253. Occupation fee.—A locator, holder, or occupant of a mining claim shall pay to the Commissioner of Internal Revenue or his duly authorized representatives on the date of the registration of the mining claim in the Office of the Mines Regional Recorder concerned, and on the same date every year thereafter an annual occupation fee of ten pesos per hectare or fractional part thereof, until the lease covering the mining claim shall have been granted. For this purpose the Office of the Mines Regional Recorder shall submit to the revenue district officer of the place where the mining claim is located or at its nearest office a complete list of all mining claims registered with it, indicating therein the name/s of locator/s, area in hectares, location, and date registered. Thirty per centum of all the fees collected under this Section shall accrue to the province, and seventy per centum to the municipality in which the mining claims are located: Provided, That in case the mining claims are located in a chartered city, the full amount shall accrue to the city concerned. Failure to pay the occupation fee herein required within thirty days after demand shall cause the mining claims to be open for relocation and lease by other persons qualified to locate and lease the same under the provisions of Presidential Decree No. 463, as amended, otherwise known as the Mineral Resources Development Decree of 1974, in the same manner as if no location of the said mining claims had ever been made, unless the locator, holder, occupant, his heirs, executors, administrators or legal representatives, shall have paid the delinquent occupation fees plus a surcharge of twenty-five per centum for every year of delinquency and have resumed occupation of the claims before relocation by other persons. "No lease shall be granted on any mining claim until the occupation fees and surcharges required to be paid under this Section shall have been fully paid: Provided, however, That nothing herein contained shall be construed to extend the period within which application for lease of mining claims shall be filed from the date of recording of the mining claims in the Office of the Mines Regional Recorder, as provided for under Presidential Decree No. 463, as amended."