Returnees in Ubay agree to lease communal lot

UNTANGLING the deadlock over the effort to subdivide the “communal lot” by the 31 returnees at the Bayanihan Resettlement Community in Tuburan Ubay coasted to a resolution or sorts. The subject lot involves some 23-hectare communal lot, which was earlier packed with the three titles that former rebels who have joined the mainstreams each got.

Sometime in the late 90's, 30 returnees were awarded the Tuburan resettlement with each getting titles to a 300 square meter homelot, 5000 sq. m. riceland and 2500 sq. m. upland for livestock forage areas. Packed with the 3 titles was a 23-hectare lot, which was designed as a common farm Bayanihan showcase, says Provincial Social Welfare and Development Officer Constancia Tuñacao in a phone interview.

The resolution came as Tuburan Resettlement Technical Working Group (TWG) composed of government agency representatives and the Provincial Government alleviated the situation faced by the Bayanihan Resettlement Community Farmers Association (BRCFA). The move to subdivide came after threats of squatting beset the communal lot owing to the inability of the BCRFA farmers to develop the farm for lack of resources.

Reports reaching this paper however detail that the move was pushed when some farmer beneficiaries mortgaged their lots and were left with nothing to lay their lands into. Similar information said an alleged member who was not initially a grantee wanted to get his own lot. The Tuburan resettlement site was only for the supposed 30 amnesty grantees. In a forum and dialog with concerned government authorities weeks earlier, the Office of the Presidential Adviser for the Peace Process (OPAPP) and the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) authorities denied the returnees motion for subdivision of the communal lot for reasons that it would first need legislation.

The DAR acquired the lots given to the amnesty grantees and the OPAPP is supervising the peace process, which includes granting support to the rebel returnees. Seeing this, the TWG proposed a sensible solution by allowing a private person to enter into a lease contract and till the 23 hectares while the association could not develop it yet.

Meanwhile, OPAPP Undersecretary Ramon Garcia has suggested for BRCFA to be a cooperative for it to avail of government financial assistance. OPAPP has also offered to sponsor a two-day pre-membership seminar for BRCFA, so as to keep the government's peace efforts and local peace talks come streaming through in this part of the country. Terminating hostilities and bringing development to the countryside is a priority project of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's Administration.

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