Farmers’ group says CA ruling a ‘slap’ on CARP

A FARMER plants rice in San Manuel, Pangasinan province, a back-breaking work for which he often doesn’t even earn enough to feed his family. WILLIE LOMIBAO/ INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON

LUCENA CITY—The decision of the Court of Appeals (CA) to nullify the certificates of land ownership award (Cloa) given to farmers in Sariaya, Quezon province, is a slap on the government’s land reform program, a farmers’ leader said on Tuesday.

Romeo Clavo, president of Ugnayan ng Magsasaka sa Gitnang Quezon (Ugnayan) based in Sariaya, said the CA ruling to dispossess the 255 farmers of the lands awarded to them in 1997 did not only affect the beneficiaries but was also a slap in the face of then Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser Pangandaman and Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa, who had both rejected the appeal of landowners to be exempted from the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

“The integrity of the government land reform program and the sincerity of its implementation have been brought into focus with the CA ruling. It is a direct challenge against the spirit of the CARP,” Clavo said in an interview on Tuesday.

On May 29, the CA 9th Division nullified the Cloas granted to the 255 beneficiaries covering 295.9 hectares of land in Barangays (village) Concepcion I, Pinagbakuran and Manggalang Kiling, owned by the heirs of Emilio Gala, on the grounds that these lands could not be covered by land reform as these were classified as nonagricultural in the 1982 zoning ordinance of the municipal government of Sariaya, or six years before the CARP took effect.

Reversal

The ruling, penned by CA 9th Division chair Associate Justice Isaias Dicdican and concurred with by Associate Justices Victoria Isabel Paredes and Melchor Quirino Sadang, was a direct reversal of the decision made only last March by the same court, which sided with the May 12, 2014, opinion of Malacañang that affirmed the 2009 ruling by Pangandaman rejecting the Gala family’s appeal for exemption from the CARP.

The Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), meanwhile, is pondering on its next move in the wake of the CA ruling.

“We are still talking about it,” Director Lynda Manluctao, head of the DAR public assistance and media relation office, replied to the Inquirer in a text message on Monday when asked what would be the DAR’s move on the CA decision.

Cynthia Lapid, Quezon’s provincial agrarian reform officer, advised the 255 Cloa holders to appeal the decision of the CA 9th Division, as the ruling was not yet final.

“For now, that’s the only move that the DAR can take,” she said in a text message.

Higher court

Clavo said the affected beneficiaries would challenge the CA decision before the Supreme Court. He said, however, that the farmers had expected a more decisive action from the DAR.

“I expect the DAR and even Malacañang to lead the affected land reform beneficiaries in defending our lands from the very suspicious and questionable decision by the CA,” he said.