Autonomy notions get lost in traffic

LETTERS FROM THE AGNO

March L. Fianza

BAGUIO CITY -- There are genuine reasons in as far as the quest for Cordillera regional autonomy or “self-rule” is concerned. The arguments of fighting for genuine regional autonomy are there but get lost in a bumper to bumper vehicular traffic which has become the primary concern of all on a daily basis.

As cited several times in the past, clamor for autonomy was due to the fact that the Cordillera provinces were then split and marginalized in the regions where they politically belonged.

Recall that the provinces of Kalinga-Apayao and Ifugao then belonged to Region 2, and the provinces of Abra, Mtn. Province, Benguet and Baguio City were then under Region 1.

Last week saw the 32nd anniversary of EO 220 signed by then President Cory on July 15, 1987 that reunited the six highland provinces and one city into the present Cordillera Administrative Region set up.

Now commonly known as Cordillera Day, it was the result of the September 13, 1986 Mount Data Peace Accord between the Aquino regime and the Cordillera Peoples Liberation Army (CPLA).

That day, the Cory Aquino regime committed a blunder by embracing the paramilitary CPLA that turned its back on the Cordillera People’s Alliance and the mass movement in the Cordillera who were also Cory allies that put her into power.

On June 1984 or three years before Cory’s EO 220, a Cordillera People’s Congress founded the CPA for the defense of the ancestral domain and for self-determination.

It first aimed to reunite the Cordillera areas mainly inhabited by indigenous peoples as an integrated region with a long term goal of becoming autonomous.

Although in the late 70s prior to the CPA being organized in 1984, there were prior moves by the governors of the five Cordillera provinces who wrote to then President Marcos to express their clamor for a unified region composed of provinces that shared common things in terms of customs, traditions and even problems.

That was not answered, although regionalization remained in their thoughts. This was evident in several projects initiated by them as government officials, and as private individuals.

Incidentally at that time, residents in highland villages, especially women, were reported to be the largest sector infected with iodine deficiency. This was the same observation reported by Mary Hensley, the first woman US Peace Corp Volunteer in Benguet who made efforts to help reduce goiter incidence in the hinterlands.

High incidence of iodine deficiency in the Cordillera was confirmed by Dr. Charles Cheng, whose research work on agricultural practices in the Cordillera said that iodine is found in highland vegetables but deforestation of our mountains was the reason why iodine in the topsoil is washed down to the sea.

With iodine deficiency reports as rallying point, an exceptional group of personnel from the Benguet Provincial Attorney’s office, US Peace Corp volunteers, doctors, motorcycle riders, musicians and artists, and the Bauko-Mankayan vegetable farmers launched the “Iodize and Regionalize” project.

All these efforts by private groups in the late 70s and early 80s struck a common sentiment that the Cordillera provinces needed an integrated region not only because its people were commonly infected with goiter but because they shared common problems.

Today’s so-called advocates of regional autonomy only came into the picture lately to push their hooded interests. They were nowhere to be found when the people were stumbling upon problems.

At night time on April 24, 1980; Ama Macliing Dulag, a former barangay chairman and respected Pangat from Kalinga and leader in the opposition against the four mega-dam projects along the Chico River was murdered in front of his wife in his own house in Bugnay, Tinglayan, Kalinga.

The World Bank-funded projects threatened to submerge hundreds of hectares of ancestral farm lands in centuries-old IP communities along the Chico River.

 Dulag’s killers were identified as Philippine Army soldiers under the command of Lieutenant Leodegario Adalem. I heard, he was also killed in an ambush.

Another problem encountered by IP communities in the Cordillera were the awarding of Timber and Pulpwood License Agreement to the Cellophil Resources Corporation and the Cellulose Processing Corporation covering almost 200 hectares of Pine forests in Abra, Kalinga, Apayao and Mtn. Province.

The issuances of the TPLAs as the initial move in the processing of cellophane for export threatened to displace around 150,000 IPs living for centuries in the watersheds and parts of their ancestral domains in the four provinces.

These were in addition to ancestral domain problems already encountered in Benguet when colonizers grabbed gold mines owned by IPs and when government itself submerged hundreds of hectares of lands to construct the Binga, Ambuclao and San Roque dams.

Indeed, the ticklish issue on ancestral lands and “control of natural resources” are enough motivations for regional autonomy. But our present advocates have placed the issue on ancestral lands in the background. In fact, ancestral lands is one topic that city officials hate to discuss.

I think in order to avoid another rejection of the organic law, the youth sector which comprises a bigger bulk of voters should be provided with the necessary history that will convince them to go for regional autonomy.

We see diverse opinions on how to achieve Cordillera autonomy. But in the course of discussions, the root issues why the Cordillera cried out for self-rule was seemingly forgotten and lost in the daily traffic.

Speaking of traffic, Cesar Fianza related to me an odd experience he met the last time he went to renew his driver license at the Land Transportation Office, Pacdal. Unexpectedly, his birthday of which was the day his driver license expires fell on a Saturday, so he had to renew it the following Monday.

Cesar narrated how he felt so unfortunate that day because aside from being locked in a bumper to bumper traffic on a busy Monday, he was apprehended by an LTO officer for violation of the seatbelt law.

Cesar said, he understood the seatbelt law and was willing to pay for the penalties for violating it. What he cannot grasp is why at the same time he is being apprehended for “driving with expired license” when he was just a few meters near the LTO and about to join the line for driver license renewal.

The apprehending officer was the former Senior Police Officer 3 Alberto Tadeo of Baguio who retired as a policeman but was recently hired back as a traffic operative with the LTO.

For any traffic officer who has the wisdom to determine a just decision from a wrong one, I believe the proper thing to do is to give human consideration to the LTO client who is in the vicinity, not to violate any law, but to transact official business.

If not, then any traffic officer can go ahead and position himself a hundred meters near the LTO entrance and apprehend all LTO clients who are about to renew their driver license and motor vehicle registration, because anyway they are deemed expired.