Squatters hunted for wrecking DENR office at Baguio watershed

BY DANNY KILLIP

BAGUIO CITY – Police are hunting “abusive squatters” who wrecked the Department of Environment and Natural Resources field Office at the Busol Watershed here at Barangay East Bayan night of May 14.

The Busol Task Force bared at the height of the counting of election ballots, intruders destroyed the back portion of the DENR building and carted away all stocked lumber, carpentry and digging tools, and office supplies.

Not contended, intruders destroyed the plywood walls, wooden beds, office furniture, wood flooring, and sawed off the inner post of the building.

The ceiling and walls were also damaged.

Francis Paatan, BTF member, said all missing lumbers and construction materials were confiscated earlier from squatters at Busol watershed.

He said it was possible the squatters’ intention was to get even and retrieve their confiscated construction materials or they wanted to claim the area their ancestral land.

Most of the seized items were carpentry tools and pine lumbers.

“There was also an event that squatters planted coffee seedling in the surroundings of the DENR building and erected a perimeter fence but this was destroyed by the BTF,” Paatan said.
He said the DENR constructed the building purposely for the Busol soil and water conservation project.

The BTF is now using structure as a guardhouse and store room for confiscated materials.
This was the second time a government structure in the area was destroyed by “squatters.”

A district guard house was torched several years ago. “It is high time that the government should act and prosecute these abusive squatters if it is really bent on protecting the watershed”, Paatan said.