More cases of land title fraud seen in GenSan

DAVAO CITY—More cases of “spurious” land titles are surfacing in General Santos City, with a parcel of land sold to a businessman in Manila as the latest example.

The General Santos City Register of Deeds has found the mother title of the 707.6-hectare property bought by a Manila-based businessman near General Santos International Airport to be spurious.

Apparently, the land is part of a 747-ha area owned by the government and is presently committed to the Integrated Forest Management Agreement (Ifma) between the government and Alsons Development and Investment Corp.

As the Register of Deeds continued its investigation, the office also discovered that the same piece of property was already being investigated by the National Bureau of Investigation after a claimant, identified as Romeo Confesor, presented a title claiming ownership of the Ifma area.

The property is one of the items discussed at a recent hearing conducted by the Senate committee on justice and human rights, chaired by Sen. Aquilino Pimentel III, after the body expressed alarm over the increase in the number of cases of fake land titles in Mindanao.

During the hearing, it was revealed that Confesor claimed that he had been the rightful owner of the property since 1956 but government records revealed that he was only 15 years old at that time.

Despite the land claims, officials from the Land Registration Authority (LRA), led by Deputy Administrator Ronald Ortile, reaffirmed the findings of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources and the NBI that claimants were holding fake titles.

And with an official report from the LRA under the Investigation Report of the Task Force Titulong Malinis, the General Santos City Register of Deeds had already recommended that the spurious land titles be deleted from the registry.–Karlos Manlupig, Inquirer Mindanao