Wednesday, June 10, 2009 [ manilatimes.net ]
The bicameral conference committee agreed Tuesday that regular tillers of land may waive their right under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (Carp) to own the land they are tilling.
The protracted discussions on the waiver of rights slowed down the complete reconciliation of the conflicting provisions of the House and Senate versions of the CARP bill at the bicam meeting at Imperial Suites along Tomas Morato Street, Quezon City. The consensus of the bicameral panel negated the provision in the Senate version, which states that when a CARP beneficiary waives his right to own the land, then other farmers would assume the right to till and own the land.
Rep. Pablo Garcia of Cebu cited the debates on agrarian reform at the 1986 Constitutional Commission where it was stressed that a farmer could not be compelled to assume responsibilities that he was not prepared or inclined to assume.
“If farmers want to remain as lessees, the Department of Agrarian Reform [DAR] cannot replace him because that is illegal,” he said.
Agrarian Reform Undersecretary Rolando Herrera said that many actual regular farmers refuse to be named beneficiaries in deference to landowners with whom they had good relations. He said that in those instances, Agrarian Reform department asks other farmers willing to till the land to take over.
Rep. Pryde Henry Teves of Negros Oriental said that the insistence of DAR to replace farmers with workers completely unknown to landowners has been one of the main causes of trouble in land covered by CARP.
The Senate panel led by Sen. Gregorio Honasan agreed to the House proposal. The other senators at the meeting were Richard Gordon, Aquilino Pimentel Jr. and Pia Cayetano.
The bicameral body, after a long debate, also agreed to include the attestation by landowners on the list of farmers actually and regularly tilling the land. Rep. Salvador Escudero 3rd said this provision would obviate the possibility of ‘UFOs” being named beneficiaries of CARP.
Garcia said that DAR officials had been given quotas on the number of hectares to be distributed under CARP, leading them to name “even drivers, hangers-on and mechanics as CARP beneficiaries.
Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. said that should there be excess land after giving the share of actual tillers, it should be given to other farmers not tilling the land.
“Just compensation” is determined by the cost of the acquisition of the land, the value of the standing crop, the current value of like properties, the sworn valuation by the owner, the tax declaration, the assessment made by government assessors and 70 percent of the zonal valuation of the Bureau of Internal Revenue.
Rep. Edcel Lagman said that title of the land covered by CARP should be registered in the name of the Republic of the Philippines only after the landowner has been fully paid by the Land Bank of the Philippines in cash and in bond.
The reconciliation was still ongoing as of press time. Speaker Prospero Nograles, who led the House panel in the morning before yielding it to Rep. Elias Bulut of Apayao, is confident that the reconciliation would be finished within the day.
--Efren L. Danao
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