Saturday, October 31, 2009 [ sunstar.com.ph ]
THE issuance of Certificate of Ancestral Land Titles (Calts) will be regulated as Baguio City has formed a screening committee for the issuance of Calts.
Mayor Reinaldo Bautista Jr. said there is already a committee formed to screen Ancestral Land Claims and the issuance of Calts in the city.
The formation of the committee is an offshoot of the dialogue between Baguio Representative Mauricio Domogan, Bautista, and National Commission on Indigenous People (NCIP) chief Eugenio Insigne last September 2. It is also supported by a recently approved resolution authored by Councilor Isabelo Cosalan.
Cosalan is the committee chairman on land use and housing in the city. In his resolution, he urged Insigne to form the Baguio Ancestral Land Clearing Committee (BALCC).
Cosalan said the BALCC is needed "to ensure that the manner by which lands within Baguio are considered as ancestral lands be done with much diligence considering such factors as the presence of prior private claims; reserved land facilities for public use and to forestall future problems that may arise as result of such declaration."
Cosalan added: "A mechanism is necessary through a clearing committee to be composed of the City Government, line agencies and concerned stakeholders as a means of verifying and confirming the veracity of claims before the same shall be processed or be given due course by the NCIP."
He said the BALCC should be composed of the city mayor as chairperson, NCIP-CAR director as vice chairperson, with members form Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR)-CAR RTD for lands, Committee on Urban Planning, Lands and Housing, and the president of the Association of Barangay Councils.
Cosalan also defined the duties of the BALCC, which include: to determine the suitability of the areas applied for ALC; the qualifications of the applicants and infrastructures which may be affected by the ALC; and to formulate or adopt its rules of procedure and guidelines for the screening and clearing of applications for ALC towards the actual processing and issuance of Calt. (Visha Calventas)
Published in the Sun.Star Baguio newspaper on November 1, 2009.
____________________________________________________________________________________
