Close Encounters With Corruption

94 hectares in Chuyo

is the object of greed and corruption.

I have always known that our government is corrupt. But now, I have the opportunity to witness it up close and personal, as a scam presently unfolds.

 Allow me to share with you updates of our dealings with the National Commission of Indigenous Peoples (NCIP), as we try to get a CALT to  our ancestral land in Chuyo. Being one of the last undeveloped wide areas in Baguio, this land is coveted by the greedy and unscrupulous. Not all the main characters in this drama have been identified yet, but will soon be, as events will soon disclose whose sticky hands are in the pie.

For a background, Chuyo belonged to the family of Bayosa Ortega four generations back. Cows grazed there. A portion was planted to camote. And a few family homes were scattered in the hillsides. It is said that among some rocks in a steep slope are the bones of our ancestors.

In 1920, a survey plan of the area was applied for and approved by the Bureau of Lands in Bayosa's name. Also in her name is a tax declaration over the property dated July 6, 1929. In 1945, then President Manuel L. Quezon issued Executive Proclamation 603 which declared roughly 94 hectares of Bayosa's land as public reservation for animal breeding purposes. This is now known as the Dairy Farm located at Green Valley. Since then, our family has been deprived of our rights to our ancestral land.

With  openings in recent legislation to correct historical injustice (eg. DAO 2, IPRA), the family pursued our claims, first under the DENR, and presently under the NCIP. Unfortunately, these claims, though backed by hard documentary evidence, never prospered to this date.

In 2002, I first got personally involved, when we built a small house inside the Dairy Farm. This was my first taste of the corruption and violence involved in attending to ancestral land claims in Baguio city.

In 2004, we filed our application for CALT in the NCIP Baguio office. We complied with all requirements and steps. And this slow and painful process has finally brought us nearer to our goal, as we had accomplished a survey of the Dairy Farm last November 14, 2008, in the presence of officials of the Department of Agriculture, the Bureau of Animal Industry, and the NCIP.

However, while following up and waiting for the good engineer of NCIP Baguio to finalize his report on the survey, we discovered that another family claimant, with no relation to the Carinos, is like a galloping stallion to our handicapped mare, and is winning the race to the finish line.

We were informed in the NCIP Baguio office, that this other family was able to accomplish in two weeks what we were striving to do, for the past two decades. Well, I believe this is a scam in the making, and I hope getting people aware of these facts will help put a stop to this brazen sins of corruption happening in our midst.

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