Saturday, May 03, 2008 Carp extension at House committee level By Gil ALfredo B. Severino
LEGAL counsel and economics-trained Roger 'Brick' Reyes clarified that the five-year extension of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (Carp) is still at the House committee level.
"The second Carp extension is presently at the committee level," Reyes said.
He however added that the second extension was approved for deliberation by the 40-member committee on agrarian reform of the House of Representative, 14th Congress, chaired by Apayao Representative Elias Bulut Jr.
Carp or Republic Act 6657 was first granted a 10-year extension which is about to expire end of June.
In an earlier Sun.Star Bacolod report, three left-leaning partylist lawmakers, in Resolution 80, urged the 14th Congress to reject any call for Carp extension, adding that a new law, "a genuine land reform law," should take its place.
Among them was Bayan Muna Representative Satur Ocampo, who was quoted as saying: "Why extend a failed and bogus land reform program?"
The militant party list representatives were Ocampo and Ted Casiño of Bayan Muna, Crispin Beltran of Anakpawis as well as Liza Maza and Luzviminda Ilagan of the Garbiela Women's party list.
In separate resolution, Ocampo, Beltran, Maza, Ilagan and Casiño urged Congress to require the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) to submit a comprehensive report on the implementation of Carp.
The move was made following reports that DAR kept the true state of the Carp implementation as reported in a study by German Technical Cooperation (GTZ).
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