Sunday, October 21, 2007 Farmers urging Palace to re-consider petition By Ryan Rosauro Ozamiz Correspondent
AROUND 137 Higaonon farmers who are fighting ownership of a 144-hectare land in Sumilao, Bukidnon is "asking a very difficult yet completely possible act of reversing itself in favor of social justice."
This, as they urged the Office of the President to take a second look at their petition for revoking a land use conversion order it issued in March 1996.
The farmers are banking on a recommendation made just last month by a regional agrarian reform official to the agrarian reform secretary that "a notice of coverage be immediately issued" to place the disputed Quisumbing estate under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (Carp).
The conversion order gave the estate, owned by the Norberto Quisumbing Sr. Management and Development Corporation (NQSRMDC), an escape from Carp coverage.
In a decision dated October 3, 2007, the Office of the President has junked the farmers' earlier petition citing that they "lack legal standing" because "they are not real parties in interest."
According the lawyer Arlene Bag-ao of non-government organization Balaod Mindanaw, which served as one of the farmers' counsels, a motion for reconsideration was filed with the Office of the President October 17.
In the motion, the farmers argued that they are real parties in interest to the case because they stand to either benefit or be disadvantaged by the actions of government relating to the estate.
The petitioning farmers are among the 137 identified beneficiaries in 1990 when the Quisumbing estate was placed under Carp coverage.
Land award
Some five years later on September 1995, they were issued a Certificate of Land Ownership Award (Cloa) by the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR).
The following month, the Cloa was registered with the Sumilao Register of Deeds, evidencing legal claim of the farmers over the supposedly redistributed estate.
Some six months later on March 1996, the land award was "taken back" when then executive secretary Ruben Torres issued the land conversion order.
When the order was upheld by the Supreme Court on August 1999, the Cloa and its corresponding land title was subsequently nullified.
Lawyer Jan Perry Eugenio of the Alternative Law Groups (ALG), which is also assisting the case, said the farmers' being previous Cloa holders is the principal proof of their being parties in interest to the revocation of the land conversion order.
Both Bag-ao and Eugenio said that if the Office of the President does not like to deal with the substance of the petition, it would be best to remand it to DAR "which has competence over the matter as it falls under its legal mandate."
Bag-ao said the Office of the President is an appellate body of DAR which, in turn, is its alter ego office for agrarian reform concerns.
Landholding
In moving for reconsideration of its October 3 decision, the farmers asked the Office of the President to consider a September 25, 2007 memorandum to the DAR secretary issued by DAR Northern Mindanao regional director John Maruhom detailing the non-compliance by the NQSRMDC of stipulations in the land conversion order.
With land conversion approval firmed up in August 1999 through a Supreme Court ruling, the NQSRMDC have until August 2004 to shift the estate's use from purely agricultural to agro-industrial activities, per DAR rules.
But Maruhom's memorandum noted that "there is nothing in the said landholding that would indicate compliance with the development proposals submitted by NQSRMDC."
"Worse, it sold the said landholding to San Miguel Foods, Inc. (SMFI)," Maruhom further noted.
The act of selling the land, Maruhom observed, is "clearly showing its non-interest to pursue the purpose for submitting an application for conversion," referring to NQSRMDC.
Even with a new owner, Maruhom said, use of the estate should still strictly follow the conversion order, adding that SMFI, which is undertaking a piggery project, should "be declared as to have violated" the rules.
Maruhom himself noted that a report of non-compliance has been submitted to the DAR secretary as early as June 20, 2005 by then regional director Alimoden Domado.
Determination
And as early as November 3, 2004, the Sumilao farmers have already asked the DAR secretary to revoke the conversion order and subject the estate again to CARP coverage.
Bag-ao said that even without the farmers' petition, Maruhom's memo, as well as others preceding it "is actionable by itself." But she doubts if the DAR secretary has endorsed the document for consideration by the Office of the President, the body whom it said has jurisdiction over the revocation petition.
The farmers' legal battle continues as 50 of their peers entered the tenth of their 60-day protest-march to Manila on Friday that kicked off October 9 in their hometown of Sumilao to demand a return of their land.
