AMID a pandemic, the Police Regional Office-Cordillera (Procor) is asking settlers within Camp Bado Dangwa to vacate their homes within 60 days.
Procor Public Information Officer Police Major Carolina Lacuata confirmed the Regional Command is in the process of recalling and reacquiring lot areas with structures set to be used as offices.
“These 180 structures currently houses former employees of the Philippine Constabulary or PC, who have lived there for many years. The Philippine National Police (PNP) is now in need of additional facilities for its growing Regional Command to fully function as a Regional Police office,” Lacuata said.
The information officer said based on Procor records, most of the inhabitants within the land area of the command have been residing there since the 1970s and 1980s and are relatives of former employees working at Camp Dangwa.
Lacuata confirmed the letter delivered June 24 to around 180 illegal settlers within Camp Dangwa signed by Deputy Regional Director for Administration Police Colonel Lawrence Coop, giving inhabitants two months to leave and self-demolish their structures or be evicted and charged.
“One hundred eighty lots where the structures have been illegally erected have been accounted for by Procor and is being reacquired. The Regional Command has conducted negotiations with the inhabitants of the said facilities to which they have been offered monetary compensation for their constructed structures, for them to be able to look for other places outside the PNP facility,” Lacuata said.
The amount of compensation offered by the Regional Command depended on the kind of structure constructed which will not be demolished but converted as offices of the different departments of Procor.
Lacuata denied that there will be any demolition in the coming days.
The letter sent to settlers of the 180 structures said based on Presidential Proclamation 157 [dated June 14, 1937], the 75,959 square meters, which they are now occupying, is reserved for military purposes, to which the said proclamation takes precedence over any title.
“Police Brigadier General R’win Pagkalinawan has not ordered any demolition but, instead, instructed the accounting of present facilities and other structures within Camp Dangwa. The Regional Command observing humanitarian conditions have offered those illegally settled in the Regional Command to discuss with the Procor's housing board, headed by Police Colonel Coop, to know what other areas of arrangements between the illegal settlers and the Regional Command can be undertaken aside from the offering of the payment for their structures,” the information officer stated.