FARMERS URGED TO SUBMIT PROPOSALS TO PLUG
LOOPHOLES OF CARP

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Q. Pimentel Jr. (PDP-Laban) today urged organizations of farmers to formulate and submit to Congress their proposals to cure the flaws and weaknesses of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform program and to make it truly responsive to their needs.

He said the farmers should make their voices heard while Congress is crafting the amendments to the CARP law (Republic Act 6657) amid widespread disappointment over the program's implementation over the last 20 years.

The farmers, according to Pimentel, should seize the opportunity to play an active role in formulating a new CARP law especially now that the Senate has committed itself to pass this legislation before the end of the current regular session.

"The sooner the amendments are done, the better for the landless tillers who are the primary beneficiaries of the agrarian reform law," Pimentel said.

"And while I am still here in the Senate, I will back such amendments to advance the cause of the landless tillers of the soil and the national interest."

During a dialogue with Catholic bishops early this week, the senators led by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile pledged to fast track the approval of the CARP bill, sponsored by Sen. Gregorio Honasan.

Last December, Congress approved Joint Resolution l9 extending the CARP for six months until June 30, 2009 as a temporary measure while the legislature is still hammering out the new law extending the program for a longer period.

At the same time, the senator from Mindanao challenged President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to back up with concrete and decisive action the commitment she gave to the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines to fully support the CARP.

He said the presidential commitment on CARP will remain under a cloud of doubt if her administration could not even settle the dispute over the Hacienda Bacan owned by the family of First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo.

All the requirements for the turnover of Hacienda Bacan in Negros Occidental to legitimate agrarian reform beneficiaries have been complied with last year. In fact, the Land Bank of the Philippines has already deposited P42.3 million for the payment of the land after all the procedures for the acquisition of the hacienda under CARP had been completed.

And yet Pimentel said the hacienda has not yet been parceled and distributed to the farmers up to now because of the dilatory tactics being employed by the owners.

"How can Mrs. Arroyo sound credible in her assurance of support for CARP when her government could not even solve the prolonged conflict over the Hacienda Bacan belonging to the family of her husband?" he said.

Pimentel said the standoff over the hacienda smacks of the President's lack of resoluteness in addressing the plight of landless farmers who have long persevered to gain ownership to a parcel of land that they are cultivating and to unshackle themselves from the bond of poverty and exploitation.

The Arroyos voluntarily offered to sell the property to the government as early as 200l. When it was about to be taken over by the Department of Agrarian Reform, Hacienda Bacan which was titled under the name of the Arroyo-owned Rivulet Agro-Industrial Corporation, the Arroyos tried to block the process by claiming that there was a pending application to convert the property into an agro-industrial estate.

Last November, Negros Occidental Register of Deeds Rodolfo Gonzaga refused to sign the papers on the transfer of the property from Rivulet to the government. Gonzaga refused to cancel Rivulet's title to the hacienda by reasoning out that the Land Bank payee should be the First Gentleman because of a notation at the back of the land title that Mr. had a lien on the property.

Pimentel said the Register of Deeds used a flimsy excused and disregarded the declaration of trust by Mr. Arroyo that he had no more interest in the hacienda and he was leaving it up to Rivulet to decide on the disposition of the property.

The turnover of the hacienda was further delayed when a Regional Trial Court in Negros Occidental issued a temporary restraining order that effectively prevented the DAR field office from enforcing the order to take over the property which has been approved by Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser Pangandaman.