Vol. XXI, No. 216 [ Business World Online ]
Wednesday, June 4, 2008 | MANILA, PHILIPPINES
PRESIDENT Gloria M. Arroyo has certified as urgent the bill seeking to extend the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) by five years.
"The President has certified as urgent for immediate enactment, House Bill [HB] no. 4077, entitled: ’An act sustaining the implementation of CARP, extending the acquisition and distribution of all agricultural lands, instituting necessary reforms and appropriating funds therefore,’" Press Sec. Ignacio R. Bunye said in a statement.
"The certification is contained in a letter to [House] Speaker [Prospero C.] Nograles, dated June 3, 2008."
The President made the move after senators admitted that the extension of the 20-year-old program may not be passed into law before it expires this June 15.
The 14th Congress is set to adjourn its first regular session on June 11.
The CARP extension is part of the priority bills listed by the Legislative-Executive Development Advisory Council.
Both the House of Representatives and the Senate have yet to approve their respective versions — the House on second reading, and the Senate at the committee level.
Apart from extending CARP for five years, HB 4077 provides for subsidized credit for agrarian reform beneficiaries and the recognition of women as CARP beneficiaries.
It also upholds the exclusive jurisdiction of the Agrarian Reform department over agrarian-related disputes.
The measure likewise forms a Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on the implementation of the extended CARP.
CARP, one of the centerpiece programs of the former Aquino administration, was enacted in 1988. It is meant to provide opportunity to farmers to own the land they till.
The Department of Agrarian Reform has yet to distribute some 200,000 hectares covered by the CARP.
In a statement, Mr. Nograles said the House is committed to pass the CARP extension bill before Congress adjourns.
He said he has instructed the House Committee on Rules to facilitate the immediate third reading approval of the CARP extension measure.
Mr. Nograles said he will push the CARP extension law to be passed as early as today, subject to amendments proposed by the Congressional Oversight Committee on Agricultural and Fisheries Modernization.
The Committee has recommended, among others to prioritize the granting of individual land titles to all beneficiaries; focus on compulsory acquisition of land rather than voluntary offer to sell and voluntary land transfer, increase budgetary allocation for support services; revitalize the Presidential Agrarian Reform Council by appointing a specific undersecretary for PARC to handle CARP, streamline DAR bureaucracy, and make credit available and accessible to CARP beneficiaries.
But Senate Majority Leader Francis N. Pangilinan and Sen. Gregorio B. Honasan II, chairman of that chamber’s Committee on Agrarian Reform, said last Tuesday that the design of the law’s extension should not be sacrificed just for the sake of beating the June 15 expiry, explaining that the committee is still waiting for DAR to submit an inventory of lands to be covered by the extension and a list of intended beneficiaries. — Alexis Douglas B. Romero
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