The Department of Public Works and Highways maintains that the anti-Chico dam heroes’ monument in Bugnay, Tinglayan, Kalinga has encroached the road right-of-way (RROW) of a national highway and demands for its immediate removal.
In its third and final notice to the Cordillera Peoples Alliance, which put up the monument, Upper Kalinga District Engineering Office (UKDEO) Head Eugene Batalao said the DPWH is mandated to safeguard and protect RROW of national roads for future widening and improvement projects.
The office earlier said the monument, which bears the images of Macli-ing Dulag, Pedro Dungoc, and Lumbaya Gayudan, is obstructing the national highway.
“Please be informed that this office has forwarded the third notice of obstruction and prohibited use within right-of-way of national roads to your office and that these notices stress on ‘voluntary removal/removal’ of the said monument. (We mean) removal as an act of moving away from a place, which is a contrary to your (interpretation) that (the monument) will be demolished, which means to destroy or forcefully tear down a structure. (Demolition) was never the implication of (our) notices,” Batalao said.
He said if the monument will not be voluntarily removed within seven days from the receipt of the notice, the DPWH will remove the monument and charge CPA for the costs incurred. The CPA received the notice Nov. 18.
The DPWH-UKDEO’s notice came after the Kalinga Philippine National Police Advisory Council recommended the demolition of the structure for allegedly bearing anti-government inscriptions.
The CPA built the monument dubbed, “Anti-Chico Dams Struggle Heroes Monument,” in April 2017 in honor of the three elders of the Butbut ethnic group of Kalinga who fought against the project that would have submerged communities and farms in the province in the ‘70s.
In an earlier letter, the National Historical Commission of the Philippines asked the local government unit of Tinglayan to respect the monument, adding, “Heroes, illustrious personages, and leaders of the locality should be treated with utmost respect and reverence.”
The CPA maintains its position against the removal of the monument, saying it sits atop a ravine and is within an ancestral domain. – Ofelia C. Empian
