DENR execs linked to land grabbing of beach fronts

Bauang residents raise howl 

By Liezle Basa Inigo

BAUANG, La Union — Land grabbing of prime beachfront properties of this town, once the “beach capital of the country,” has gone rampant due to the connivance of officials of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) regional office and an influential group of real estate developers believed well connected with high government authorities, including the Office of the Solicitor General, the judiciary and the military.

         If remained unchecked, the land grabbing operations may lead to a bloody conflict between the landowners and the real estate group.

This developed as one of the affected lot owners, Ann Paredes, filed a case for violation of the anti-graft and corrupt practices act against three officials of the DENR before the Office of the Ombudsman (OMB).

Named respondents in the case were Graciano Boquiren, special investigator assigned at the DENR’s office in

Pangasinan; and Santiago S. Santiago, Jr. and Arnel Manalac, both geodetic engineers of the agency’s regional office in San Fernando, La Union.

The complainant claimed that Boquiren, Santiago and Manalac conspired in faking a survey that declared Paredes’ 761 square meter property as “underwater and salvage zone” thus prompting the agency to issue a reversion/cancellation order turning the lot as “part of the public domain.”

With the reversion/cancellation order, the DENR then awarded the property to a certain Alberto Hidalgo who had applied for foreshore leasehold on the property.

Paredes protested the action taken by the agency in a complaint-letter to then DENR Secretary Ramon Paje.

But while her protest was being investigated, DENR regional executive director Samuel Penafiel approved Hidalgo’s application for a foreshore lease agreement (FLA).

Armed with the FLA, Hidalgo, according to the complaint  of Paredes, developed the otherwise “underwater” property” into a “high-end” beach housing estate, using goons led by a certain Ricardo Aromin.

Hidalgo’s group first put up huts and semi-permanent structures to assert its position on the government-leased lot owned by Paredes.

Having positioned in the area, the influential Hidalgo group also managed to sell two-parcel lots, just alongside Paredes’ property, to a Norwegian national married to a Filipina and to a Swiss national, also married to a Filipina, who constructed a P20-million mansion and a P30-million house, respectively.

“How can they build big houses if the lands were underwater as declared by the DENR,” Paredes contended in her complaint.

To substantiate her complaint, Paredes presented to the Ombudsman a copy of the transfer certificate of title (TCT) issued by the Register of Deeds of La Union.

Two other beachfront properties with an aggregate area of 1,925 sq. m. owned by Immaculada Corazon Lim and Cherry Lyn Dy Castillo were similarly issued reversion/cancellation of title orders by the DENR.

Like in Paredes’ case, Lim’s and Castillo’s properties were awarded to Hidalgo under a foreshore lease agreement granted to him by the DENR.