[ Manila Bulletin Online ] November 22, 2008
By MARVYN N. BENANING
BACOLOD CITY— Sixty farmers going after the 155-hectare Hacienda Bacan in Barangay Guintubhan, Isabela, Negros Occidental stumbled on another hindrance to own part of the estate owned by the family of First Gentleman Mike Arroyo.
Buoyed by the approval of their plea by the Land Bank of the Philippines and the Department of Agrarian Reform, the farmers believed it was a matter of time before they are finally installed in the estate, not knowing that the Register of Deeds (RD) here would block such attempt.
Jose Rodito Angeles, a peasant leader, said the RD rejected the registration of the Certificate of Land Ownership Award (CLOA) issued by the DAR provincial office to the farmers unless LBP revokes the certificate of cash deposit it issued in favor of Rivulet Agro-Industrial Corp.
The RD wants another certificate of deposit issued in the name of the President’s husband. Angeles said the refusal to register the CLOA was uncalled for since such function was just ministerial, adding that the local register’s office must defer to the authority of DAR on the matter.
He said the DAR issued the CLOA for some 60 farmer-beneficiaries of Hacienda Bacan after LBP released the COD to Rivulet two weeks ago. The corporation claimed to be the owner of the land and possessed a title to prove it.
Loosely translated, the Spanish term "arroyo" means rivulet or hole in English. Angeles explained that the COD requirement before DAR could issue the CLOA had actually been prepared way back in July but was withheld after Rivulet’s lawyer, Ruy Alberto Rondain, wrote the LBP to defer the issuance because the company had a pending application for land conversion.
He said DAR checked its records and found out that there was no pending application for conversion and ordered LBP to issue the COD, but the bank refused, saying it would only do so if DAR Secretary Nasser Pangandaman himself gave the order in a formal letter.
Pangandaman never gave the order.
LBP was finally compelled to issue the COD after Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel, in a hearing conducted on Nov. 10, grilled LBP and DAR officials and asked for a certification from DAR Undersecretary for Legal Affairs Renato Herrera that Rivulet had no pending application for land conversion.
