Casa Vallejo on my mind

LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL

Roger D. Sinot

PINSAO PROPER, Baguio City – A realist once said, "We cannot change history but we can correct it". As the City of Pines celebrates Charter Day, houses and concrete skyrise buildings rise, with or without building permits, in all corners of the city. Houses and excavations are being done in all parts of the mountains and hills such as Mount Santo Tomas, Aurora Hill, Quezon Hill, all hills surrounding Guisad Valley, and the Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) is no longer an area for “plants” but of “buildings”.

 Buildings are all over steep hills, creeks, watersheds, roads-right-of-way, titled or not. A balikbayan said, "Idi, no kayat mo nga makitatay balay, iwalin mo tay kaykayu. Ita, no kayat mo nga makitatay kayu, iwalin mo tay balbalay!" (Before, you had to set apart the trees on a former pine clad steep hill if you wanted to see the house on top of the hill. Now, you have to set apart the congested houses if you want to see the pine trees if there are any left).

 Since the birth of this beloved town as a charter city in 1909, the Americans dreamed of an ideal haven for a population of 25,000. Seen on pictures nowadays, almost all sections are filled with houses just like a cupful that contains more than it takes. We can see with the naked eye an urban chaos here, a city of garbage, a city we ought not to retire on. What is left now for the Ibaloy ancestral land owners who stood by the policy of city hall of "no title, no building permit?"

 "Kinamkam sha lai bu’day!" At the time when squatting was a “livelihood” for many, they even say, "Bagim ti papel ta bagi mi ti daga! The Americans grabbed the lands from the Ibalois, and their way of government called democracy was inherited by our officials since they left. These government men manned and managed the country and its people by using proclamations and decrees to uproot the original settlers of the city especially in the central area, heart of the city. Up to now, city officials are driving away the Ibaloys and their rights over their lands. “Kamkam” is an Ibaloy term meaning “grab” from an Ibaloy dictionary. History repeats itself and even a long history of land grabbing have not been resolved but instead cultured.

The National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, the arm of the government mandated to enforce the Indigenous Peoples Right Act or IPRA issued a certificate of Ancestral Land Title to CosenPiraso, one of the Baguio early settlers who happened to be old folks of mine. With that, the heirs were given permission to take hold of the land where this city's old hotel, the Casa Vallejo was built. It was a victory on the part of IPs, Ibaloys' struggle to reclaim their Ancestral Lands taken from them as a result of American colonization.

Now comes the City government man, questioning the CALTs issued by the NCIP to Ibaloys. Why not believe in the fact that the Ibalois were here before the Americans came?

An ancestral land application folder was shown to me last week. Turning to the genealogy page, I was surprised to see my grandmother listed as one of the heirs of Piraso. I was about to join the Baguio day parade last September 1st together with the Onjon ni Ivadoy, but a text was sent to me by my cousin March Fianza that says, "Why celebrate the day when our lands were taken away from us?”

So instead of joining the parade, I went to see my auntie Priscilla Camdas Balacio to verify the genealogy. Auntie said that Eljag Dacmi Piraso or Soven, the mother of my mother Felisa, was one of the sisters of her mother Coteling Amay and Cosen. Camdas and Dalisdis were brothers who married the Coteling and Eljag sisters. So Cosen Piraso, the Ibaloi claimant of that CALT over the land where the Vallejo stands, is my grandmother or grandaunt.

Which came first? The Casa Vallejo, the honorable mayor, or the Pirasos? With due respect Sirs, when crime is committed, why punish the victim? I remember the famous Hollywood actor John Wayne who once repeated the famous saying, “When you allow unlawful acts to go unpunished, you're moving towards a government of men rather than a government of laws.” Light houses don't go running all over an Island looking for boats to save. They just stand in one part of the island shining their lights.”

Land grabbing was never corrected but rather patronized. In what I have read, God the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, had given these lands to them that are there. The rule of the government is to recognize. The truth is, who would dispute the use of the words “Since time immemorial”? This term is also used in the quest for regional autonomy. Now where is consistency here?

The local government is turning a blind eye on the fact that squatting is too alarming in the city. It is ridiculous for government to consider national proclamations to make their acts valid against the Ibaloys, but not to squatters.

When an Ibaloy builds his house to protect his property from squatters, the government strictly requires building permits, but when a land speculator builds his overnight mushroom house in an ancestral land and the landowner requests for a demolition order, sad to say but one needs to show a certificate of title over his land before a demolition order is issued in his favor.

We, Ibaloys want to be known for who we are today. We are living, we are breathing, we still have our culture, and we still have our language like any other groups in the Cordillera. I think for some reasons, society forgot about the early settlers of Baguio.

I pray that God helps the people in the government correct the injustices done by their colleagues in the government. A sage once said, "Politics is not dirty, it is the people that makes it dirty!" So, help us God.