Farmers want to occupy top corporations’ Maguindanao lands

COTABATO CITY—Maguindanao farmers want landholdings in the province  of three giant companies, including San Miguel Corp. (SMC), distributed under the expanded agrarian reform law.

Hadja Kabayan Bakar, provincial agrarian reform officer, said SMC was willing to part with its landholdings in Paglat and SK Pendatun towns.

She said an SMC representative had been negotiating the sale to the Department of Agrarian Reform of the company’s 992-hectare estate in the two towns for P200,000 per hectare.

Another company, Sarmiento Industries Inc., wanted P250,000 per hectare for its property in Sultan Mastura town.

But Bakar said the provincial agrarian reform office was still trying to revive its land procurement program after a long suspension, triggered by a massive land scam uncovered in 1999.

The scam—involving counterfeit titles—covered most of Maguindanao’s prime farmlands and had stained the implementation of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program in the province, she said.

Some farmers have become impatient, according to Bakar, but authorities succeeded in convincing them not to take over corporate landholdings.

She cited Tuesday’s case during which officials had convinced farmers in Buldon town to leave a 1,268-hectare estate owned by Dela Rosa Logging Co. alone.

Dela Rosa left the area after ceasing its logging operations in 1989.

Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu said what the provincial government did was to offer 319 hectares of an adjacent area in Buldon to corn farmers in the town to prevent them from taking over properties belonging to companies.

In Maramag, Bukidnon, farmers were celebrating after the government granted their petition to cancel the Forest Land Grazing Lease Agreement (FLGLA) of the Ocaya Ranch, which is being operated by Circle Development Corp. (Citadeco) —covering some 820 hectares—in the barangays of Danggawan and Kuya.

In its recent decision, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources said Ocaya Ranch violated its FLGLA when it subleased the land to Citadeco. The 25-year FLGLA was to expire this year. Nash B. Maulana and Dennis Jay C. Santos, Inquirer Mindanao