Giving autonomy a chance

BENCHWARMER
Ramon Dacawi

BAGUIO CITY -- “It’s high-time for us to give autonomy a chance to show itself. Release this horse to the open so we can see its real color and character. It may turn out to be a winner, after all.”

With that metaphor, anthropologist and teacher Ike Picpican last Monday explained why there’s a renewed push for autonomy in the Cordillera led by Baguio mayor Mauricio Domogan, who was designated chair of the committee to draft the organic act.

“Instead of dwelling on pessimism, let’s give the horse a try, believing in the good faith and wisdom of those who will draft the organic act for autonomy,” Picpican said at a forum last Monday with members of the committee on indigenous peoples of the Regional Development Council. “As the rider, we can harness the horse, rein it in if it’s going wayward,” the Picpican said.

Committee chair Amador Batay-an, also the regional director of the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, explained that autonomy will empower the region to act on issues peculiar and pressing to the Cordillera but which it could not under the present administrative set-up.

He said that even with the Indigenous People’s Rights Act (IPRA), “we are saddled with the same concerns”, referring to national policies not applicable to the Cordillera because of the region’s peculiarities.

Specifically, he cited a 2006 agreement between Mt. Province and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources that would have allowed traditional owners of pine tree stands in the province to harvest what they planted for their domestic needs.

“We had formulated the rules but the final draft was signed only last week,” he lamented, adding this still needs confirmation by the NCIP and the DENR in the national level.

Earlier, DENR regional executive director Clarence Baguilat noted that the peculiarities of the Cordillera necessitates an autonomy structure for the region to address its own priorities that fall outside national concerns and standards.

Specifically, he lamented that while the protection and conservation of the Cordillera pine and mossy forests is crucial to the region’s role as watershed cradle, there is hardly support for the program, given the DENR’s national focus on massive reforestation.

Agriculture regional director Lucrecio Alviar also noted the region hardly gets funding for its upland vegetable production because of the national priority on corn and rice production.

“We have already learned our lesson from the two exercises,” Picpican said, referring to the rejection in two plebiscites of the of two previous autonomy charters, with only Ifugao voting for the first and only Apayao adopting the second.

A survey done by the RDC showed rejection was partly due to lack of information and knowledge on the shape and form of autonomy the Cordillera was to venture into. To address the mistake, the committee to draft the third autonomy organic act adopted five principles as bases for the said charter.

“These principles will explain, so to speak, what horse we’re talking about and offering,” Domogan said in earlier consultations to gather inputs to the organic act.

These principles are on the establishment of a permanent regional identity for the Cordillera, non-diminution of benefits and powers under the present regular administrative region, continuous national budgetary allocation for government line agencies in the region, national annual subsidy for the autonomous region over and above its regular allocation for a period of 10 years, and sustained budgetary support thereafter.

Under the first principle, “the exploitation, exploration, development, enjoyment and utilization of natural resources found in the CAR shall be under the control, permission and supervision of the regional government upon due consultation, except with respect to uranium, coal and petroleum which shall be under the control and supervision of the national government.”

Following an autonomy-within-autonomy structure, the drafting committee emphasized that “the autonomy and independence of each local government unit included in the regional government shall remain”.

This means, Domogan said, that the provinces will continue to have their own governors and representatives in Congress, vice-governors; the cities and towns their own mayors down to councilors and the barangays their own punong barangay and kagawad.

On the subsidy from the national government, the drafting committee proposed P10 billion annually for the first five years and P5 billion annually for the next five years, or a total of P75 billion.

Domogan said equal sharing of the subsidy by dividing it into eight (six provinces, the city of Baguio and the regional government) would be practical compared to the formula used for the Internal Revenue Allotment, which is based on population and area of each local government unit.

He noted that because of its relatively small population and area, the Cordillera receives much less IRA compared to the other regions of the country, resulting in its slow development despite being a major resource base for national progress.

“This discrepancy in development is precisely the reason for the constitutional provision for the establishment of autonomy in our region,” he said. “Autonomy will give the national government legal basis for extending support to us over and above what we are receiving under an administrative set-up which is supposed to temporary and mandated to flesh out autonomy,” he said.

Summing up the push, Picpican noted the only way to know whether the horse is a winner or loser is to ride it. “If we ride it and it does not run, then we can condemn it to the slaughterhouse, but not before we try it,” he cautioned. (e-mail:mondaxbench@yahoo.com for comments).