BEHIND THE SCENES

High profile killings of MP folk/RDC dilemma
ALFRED P. DIZON

Mountain Province has recently been in the national news due to high profile killings. These included the ambush-murder of Paracelis mayor Ceasar Rafael, suicide bombing of Sagada native Zennia Aguilan in Afghanistan and slay of Arcelie Laoagan, whose blood-soaked body was found by subway train workers behind a church in Calgary, Alberta.

Rafael was killed Christmas day last year, Aguilan a few days later and Laoagan on Jan. 17. According to Canadian newspapers, Laoagan, also a Sagada native, was the second migrant worker killed in Canada in recent months.

Laoagan was reported missing on Jan. 17 when she didn’t return home. An online report of the Calgary Herald said she called friends when she was attacked. Train workers later found her sprawled near the Grace Baptist Church. Laoagan’s children flew to Calgary last week to identify her body.

Newspaper reports said Laoagan, who had resided in Calgary for four years, had two jobs to sustain here family back home. The regional Cordillera office of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration had records of Laoagan being deployed to Hong Kong by a local recruitment agency in 2004. Laoagan reportedly worked for two years as a maid there. ***
In the case of Rafael’s murder, it is a welcome development that Cordillera police headed by regional police director Chief Supt. Eugene Martin and Mountain Province police director Supt. Joseph Adnol solved the case. (See page 1 for details.)
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Much ado had been talked about by some cause-oriented groups in the Cordillera on how ancestral lands should be apportioned and titled. The argument of one group is that indigenous customs and traditions like those related to ancestral lands should be enhanced so tribal folk would not fight or kill each other over these. No beef with that, but indigenous tribes, clans or families are now at odds over lands even over tayan (communal lots) due to greed of some members. It is called agum in the local kankanaey dialect.

And it is a shame that some so-called elders have been used by the agum to forward their vested interests during settlement meetings for a few pesos. When the elders are tapped to talk on land ownership to settle land disputes, the corrupt among them side with the moolah giver. Indigenous customs and traditions (like on settling land ownership) are on the wane and for those who got an education, the courts are the preferred venue in settling such disputes.

“Bringing back the culture” among the natives is the romanticized thrust of some non-government organizations who rely on foreign funding to exist, but then, what are funds for? Romanticism is no crime, but then, the harsh reality -- it is a dog-eat-dog-world in the arena of ancestral land ownership not only in the Cordillera but elsewhere in the country. ***
Settling ancestral land disputes is not an easy task for indigenous groups or government agencies. That is why, it maybe worth watching what the Regional Development Council in the Cordillera would do after urging the central offices of the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to hasten issuance of guidelines for implementation of section 12 of Republic Act 8371 or the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act.

According to the RDC, there is urgent need to issue a joint DENR-NCIP joint circular because of the specified 20-year period for the implementation of IPRA whose period would end on October 2017. During the Aug. 22, 2007 meeting of the regional peace and order council in the Cordillera, it was the consensus that absence of a government land-tenure instrument for indigenous peoples over their lands was one of the root causes of social unrest and insurgency in the region.

The RDC executive committee earlier issued a resolution following up a joint commitment of the DENR and NCIP to issue a joint circular on the implementation of Section 12 of the IPRA which provides the option to the indigenous peoples to secure certificates of title to their ancestral lands under provisions of Commonwealth Act No. 141 as amended. Several consultations, according to RDC members, had been conducted by the regional and central offices of both agencies to facilitate the issuance of the joint circular, but up to the present, not such circular is forthcoming.

A recent meeting of the indigenous peoples’ sectoral committee and the RDC executive committee was held and queries were asked on status of the DENR-NCIP joint circular, but no firm commitment was made by top officials of both agencies despite a draft being provided to them. The draft guidelines were earlier prepared by the Cordillera offices of the NCIP and DENR. RDC officials said a long delay in the issuance of the guidelines might result in failure to implement the IPRA.
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It is quite confusing why the RDC is pushing the said guidelines when at the same time, it is pushing autonomy. From the point of view of autonomy advocates, this is pushing the cart ahead of the horse. Their bone of contention is if the RDC is indeed sincere in realizing the creation of a Cordillera autonomous region, why is it pushing the land guidelines? Such guidelines, they say, should be crafted first in an organic act and subjected to the people for ratification in a plebiscite.

A P15 million budget had been allotted by Malacanang for information drives on autonomy but then, like in the land guidelines – tungpal bilin. Pundits are now questioning how the P15 million was spent when there were no massive information drives on autonomy in Cordillera provinces.

Maybe, the RDC, even in a press release could enlighten us on the matter like if a pig or two were butchered on such occasion. If members are transparent enough, they could post a detailed accounting of how the funds were spent, so the jesters and the critics would keep their mouths shut. At this time the silence of the RDC on the matter is deafening.