Who really owns the Asinhydros?

LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL

Roger Sinot

The current row between Baguio City government and the Tadiangan-Nangalisan Hydro Ancestral Landowners Association, Inc. (TNHALA) brings to mind a scene about a very sleepy and yawning lion that has a hard time staying on his feet faced a very determined mouse. The lion pounds away the mouse with his gloves at his numbed foe’s feet.

The city government is eager to have the rusty and dysfunctional Asin facilities bided out. It bided out the facility for three times but failed, after operating it from 2007 to 2012. The city is apparently busy figuring out now the huge profits it could generate in the future. Unfortunately, for the poor landowners of Asin whose lots are host to the electric plants and traversed by giant plume lines are being sadly ignored even with a Compromise Agreement. They were dismissed as insignificant elements. On the contrary, the TNHALA is a sleepy yawning lion.  

The Asin hydros were built by then Mayor Eusebius G. Halsema who was on different occasions, Baguio mayor, city engineer and Benguet district engineer during his 17-year stint in government from 1920 to 1937.  While the city government is treating the small landowners insignificantly, it is also in for a bombshell. Halsema who was city engineer, mayor and Benguet district engineer, not necessarily in that order, built the hydro-electric plants to electrify the gold mines and timber yards that were all located in Benguet, and eventually supplied power for the city’s government buildings.

If so, then it was probable that funds from Benguet were used in the construction of the Asinhydros. It is unthinkable that the city funded the construction of the Asin hydros that powered the Benguet mines. It makes no sense. In the same manner, constructing the famous Mountain Trail by Halsema and opening it to motor vehicles in 1930 while he was mayor of Baguio is absurd.      

To think of how Baguio came to claim ownership of the Asinhydros is perplex. But to speculate, it may have been forcibly harnessed for use by the Japanese forces during their occupation of the city in World War 2, and erroneously had stuck in the minds of city officials ever since that the AsinHydros was a owned by the city. Besides, the few people who might have known who the real owners of the hydro-electric plants were might not have made it after the war. In fact, nobody has seen documents that showed that the city owned the facilities, much less the area where they were built.

One other explanation is that the hydro-electric plants could have been fixed by the liberating American soldiers who stayed in Baguio rather than in Benguet after the war, so that ownership subtly, with no fanfare, changed hands to the disadvantage of the shy and withdrawn Benguet folk. This may not be proven as I was not yet a living soul at that time, although I am quite sure that people will outrun each other to the library and the archives in a bid to get to the truth.

Assuming the Asinhydros were constructed under the BOT scheme (build-operate-transfer), its operations that enriched the city for a time should have been transferred a long time ago to the LGUs concerned, but that was not the case. Today, the LGU members of the BLISTT (Baguio, La Trinidad, Itogon, Sablan, Tuba, Tublay) should rethink of their positions and what Baguio has contributed to their existence or the other way around. Tuba and its concerned barangays should consider planning about owning the Asinhydros, after all the facilities that have yet to be proven as under the ownership of Baguio, are inside their territory. Happy trails to all 2ba boys and girls!