Luisita farmers still 15 steps from owning land

Six months after the Supreme Court handed down the decision ordering the immediate distribution of the Hacienda Luisita, farmer-beneficiaries are a step closer, yet still far from becoming its owners.

Under the Department of Agrarian Reform’s (DAR) normal land-distribution process, the Hacienda Luisita farmers are still 15 steps away from becoming owners of their own piece of land.

The first and most important step in the land-distribution process—the identification of qualified farmer-beneficiaries or the screening and validation process—is far from over until the department has come up with the final list, hopefully, before the end of the year.

After the DAR released last week the preliminary master list of potential farmer-beneficiaries containing the names of 5,365 farmer-beneficiaries deemed as and the provisional list containing the names of 1,221 farmers-beneficiaries who still need to submit additional proof of their qualification, the inclusion and exclusion process begins.

The inclusion and exclusion process allows farmers who felt they are supposed to be in the final list of qualified farmer-beneficiaries to appeal their case for inclusion, while anyone who felt somebody in the list should be delisted may file a petition for exclusion.

Those on the provisional list, according to Agrarian Reform Secretary Virgilio de los Reyes, have until the end of month to submit additional proof that they are really Luisita farmers, considering that they have no record with the Social Security System based on the SSS list the DAR obtained.

Farmers’ organizations such as the Hacienda Luisita-based Alyansa ng Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Luisita (Ambala), United Luisita Workers Union and the Farmers Agrarian Reform Movement (FARM) are now scrutinizing the two lists released by the DAR, with the hope of conducting their own screening and validation process.

There are, however, 14 more important and often tedious steps to complete before farmers could actually be installed and start cultivating their land awarded through the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

These include the preparation of the master list of the qualified farmer-beneficiaries; segregation and subdivision survey; field work or actual aerial and ground surveys; preparation of the survey plan; submission of the survey plan to the Land Management Sector (LMS) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR); approval of the survey plan; valuation by the Land Bank of the Philippines and completion of claim folder documentation; issuance of certificate of deposit (COD) after payment to the land owner; completion of land distribution; allocation of lots; transmittal of COD and the approval of survey plan to the Register of Deeds; cancellation of titles and issuance of title under the name of the Republic of the Philippines; Generation of Certificates of Land Ownership Awards (CLOAs) and the registration with the Registry of Deeds; Awarding of CLOAs to qualified farmer-beneficiaries and installation of farmer-beneficiaries to their CARP-awarded lands.

The DAR’s self-imposed deadline to complete the Hacienda Luisita distribution is exactly a year after the Supreme Court handed down its decision in April 2012.

De los Reyes said the segregation and subdivision, land survey and preparation of survey plan are now ongoing and the land valuation was, likewise, set in motion.

While de los Reyes is confident of meeting the agency’s self-imposed deadline, which is to complete the land distribution process by April 2013, critics of the Aquino administration and farmer-beneficiaries themselves are highly skeptical, considering that the land-distribution process sometimes takes more than a decade—because of, among other factors, strong landlord resistance, problematic titles or missing titles, and tedious cases that are currently piled up at the DAR Adjudication Board (Darab).

The SC order was for the DAR to distribute the 4,335-hectare portion to “more or less” 6,296 farmer-beneficiaries who are also entitled to a share in the P1.33-billion income from sale or proceeds of the 500-hectare lot that was subject of the August 14, 1996 land conversion order, and the 80.51- hectare lot acquired by the government as part of the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway project.

Currently, the DAR is coordinating with various stakeholders in the selection of a reputable accounting firm that will audit the books of Hacienda Luisita Inc. (HLI) to determine the legitimate corporate expenses deductible from the P1.33-billion proceeds to be shared to farmer-beneficiaries as ordered by the SC.

A meeting held on October 24 led to an agreement that farmer-organizations may recommend an accounting firm. FARM and Ambala vowed to make their recommendations and the DAR is waiting for their letter of intent for the purpose, according to DAR Tarlac Provincial Agrarian Reform Officer (Paro) Emmanuel Aguinaldo.

Meanwhile, the DAR has already tapped as of September this year the services of FF Cruz&Co. for the segregation of the HLI agricultural land, with a total gross area of 4,915.75—from the combined 580.51 hectares, and for which the company awarded with the contract to conduct the land survey activities are expected to present its plan to concerned parties, including the HLI, concerned government agencies and farmer-organizations that have stake in the Hacienda Luisita land-distribution process.

The segregation survey is expected to be completed by January 2013 and the subdivision survey by March 2013. The road and irrigation canal, according to the DAR chief, will not be distributed but will form part of land to be commonly shared by and among farmer-beneficiaries, but still subjected to land valuation by the Land Bank of the Philippines as part of compensating the land owner and in determining the amount to be paid by qualified farmer-beneficiaries for what is to be awarded to them under the program.

De los Reyes, the agency is right on schedule in as far as the distribution of the Hacienda Luisita is concerned.

Hacienda Luisita, owned by the family of President Aquino, straddles 10 barangay in Tarlac City, the province’s capital, and the towns of La Paz, and Concepcion.

It is the biggest private landholdings ever to be distributed by the agency in the last 24 years and the process of interviewing the 8,641 claimants or applicants alone took 120 field personnel six months to come up with the preliminary master list of potential farmer-beneficiaries. –Jonathan Mayuga / Reporter, Businessmirror