Controversial DAR land title cancelled

By Rommel Lengwa

BONTOC, Mountain Province-The Office of the Regional Adjudicator of the Department of Agrarian Reform-Cordillera has ordered the cancellation of a controversial land title here covered under the Original Certificate of Title No. 0-774-C bearing CLOA No. 002565.

Regional Agrarian Reform Adjudicator Walter R. Carantes, in his decision said one ground for the immediate cancellation of the controversial Certificate of Land Title or CLOA was: lack of prior notice and consultation to the landowners by the DARPO of Mountain Province.

Carantes also ruled there was no actual field identification of the properties in such a way that many of the names of the landowners which was recorded and annotated in the CLOA were not the actual landowners and there was failure of the DARMO to answer complaints lodged by Barangay Samoki landowners.

According to Carantes, the failure to file an answer is an admission of the basic right of a person to due process of law.

He cited that DAR Administrative Order No. 2, Series of 1996 required that the DAR through its municipal agrarian reform officer has to send notices to prospective agrarian reform beneficiaries on the date of scheduled field investigation at least two weeks in advance.

The same DAR issuance mandates the MARO to conduct a field investigation of the property.
The case arose after the Samoki Land Owners Organization led by Tomasa Sangayab and former mayor Alfonso Kiat-ong Sr. filed a case against DARPO and the Registry of Deeds, all of Mountain Province on Dec. 14, 2007, seeking the immediate cancellation of the controversial land title.

“The decision was faster than lightning,”Sangayab said when asked how she felt about the proceedings that lasted for less than three hours.

In a separate interview, Kiat-ong, thanks the judge for his quick and outright decision. “A unique case because immediately during the first hearing, the case was decided thus prolonging not the agony of both the petitioners and the respondents,” he said.

On Dec. 24,1997, a certificate of land title covering an area of 1,158,643 sq. meters was issued to one Ericson Akiate et al.

The CLOA which was the subject of previous tabloids and has been questioned by most people in Bontoc and Samoki who claimed to have properties in the area covered by the CLOA but whose names were not included in DAR’s list of landowners.

What aggravated the controversy was the fact that names of people with no properties in the area were listed beneficiaries in the perfected CLOA.