We are afraid that the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA), which is supposed to uphold the rights of Indigenous Peoples in this country is being perverted by unscrupulous people in order to acquire choice lands in Baguio City and have them titled in their names.

The land in question is the 94-hectare Baguio Dairy Farm under the Bureau of Animal Industry in Shuyo, Green Valley, one of the last undeveloped lands within the city, now coveted by the greedy and powerful.

This land is part of the homestead of my great-grandmother, Bayosa Ortega, wife of Mateo Cariño, where they had their homes, raised cattle, and planted camote. As early as 1920, this land was a subject of a survey. In June 1920, Survey Plan II-13320 in Bayosa’s name was approved by the Director of Lands. Also, said parcel of land was declared for taxation purposes as early as July 1929, and Tax Declaration No. 244/31 was issued by the Municipality of Tuba, Benguet to Bayosa Ortega.

However, in August 1940, 94 hectares of this land was expropriated without just compensation when then president Manuel L. Quezon issued Executive Proclamation 603, which declared this land for animal breeding purposes, under the administration of the Director of Animal Industry.

In September 1990, our family filed under DENR DC No. 03, s. 1990, an application for the recognition of ancestral land over the subject parcel of land, before the DENR, Special Task Force on Ancestral Lands (DENR-STFAL). In the investigation report dated Dec. 18, 1991, the DENR-STFAL investigator said the “subject application has satisfied the requirements for a valid ancestral land claim.”

In 1997, with the passage of IPRA, we pursued our claim with the National Commission of Indigenous Peoples (NCIP). Since 2004, we have complied with all their requirements, step by step, in the Baguio Office of the NCIP. And on Nov. 14, 2008, a perimeter survey was conducted by NCIP Baguio engineer Victor Bumatnong in the presence of the Department of Agriculture and BAI officials, based on a Work Order 08-07-08 released by the national office of NCIP. We thought that this survey was bringing us closer to our goal of having our ancestral land be recognized. Little did we know that some magic was brewing in the national office of the NCIP.

The ancestral claim of the Heirs of Ikang Paus over the same piece of land is presently the subject of deliberations of the NCIP Commission en banc despite its being anomalous since it overlaps with the Cariño claim. We were informed by NCIP commissioner Rizalino Segundo of Region 2 that the Commission en banc has had deliberations on the Paus claim, which was favorably endorsed by NCIP Baguio officer Gladys Lasdacan,  CAR regional director Atty. Amador Batay-an, and ancestral domains officer Myrna Caoagas. And that it is now just awaiting the signing of the resolution awarding this piece of land to the Heirs of Ikang Paus.

NCIP commission chair Eugenio Insigne, when asked today, said that they are deliberating on awarding 67 hectares to the Paus family, because they have proof that they were developing this land for the past 60 years. But does this not send the wrong signals that the NCIP tolerates squatting and will award lands to those who can show some structures and sayote plants, despite having anomalous and fraudulent documents?

In 2003, Baguio City demolished 31 houses and shanties of the Heirs of Ikang Paus, because they illegally entered and built structures in the Dairy Farm. They were granted a TRO and a preliminary injunction by the NCIP Regional Hearing Office, but which were overturned by the Court of Appeals in 2005 because NCIP was judged to have no jurisdiction over the case, meaning it is not a case of ancestral land and indigenous peoples’ rights.

In 2003, the Heirs of Ikang Paus filed Land Registration No. N-42334 before the Court of First Instance of Baguio and Benguet, wanting to have OCT # 13 in the name of Ikang Paus registered. However, this title when researched in the Baguio Register of Deeds, in fact was issued to a certain Cotilang, wife of Camdas, and not to Ikang Paus.

Also in 2003, the Heirs of Ikang Paus, in a bid to stop the impending demolition of their illegal structures, presented a Certification from the NCIP, issued on May 9, 2003 with control No. ADO-ALC-0001, signed by a certain Noela O. Zunega on behalf of Benedict Lumauig certifying that they filed a petition docketed as BC-0122-GVJ for recognition and delineation of Ancestral Land Claim. However, on June 9, 2003, Atty. Reuben Dasay Lingating, then chair of NCIP, issued Memorandum Order 256, stating that the Paus certification was revoked and recalled for being patently illegal and a gross misrepresentation.

We hope the commissioners are enlightened and guided by the wisdom of our ancestors, and stand for the welfare of the rightful claimants and indigenous peoples, when they make a decision to put their signature on a CALT for the Paus family or not. And we hope that by making this public, we can avoid the commission of a mistake, which will compound the historical injustice and land grabbing which the original Ibaloi families of Baguio have suffered for one century now. We hope that the Centennial of Baguio will not be marred by another case of landgrabbing, sponsored now by the NCIP, in the footsteps of the American colonial government a hundred years ago.