The city government of Baguio is urging the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples to come up with guidelines on the registration of transfer certificates of title or derivative titles originating from originally issued certificates of ancestral land titles (CALTs) pursuant to the memorandum of agreement entered between the Land Registration Authority and the NCIP.
On Aug. 28, 2002, the LRA and the NCIP agreed to define the areas of coordination to determine the extent of authority and determine both agencies’ responsibilities relative the registration of certificates of ancestral land domain titles (CADTs)/CALTs with the Registry of Deeds (ROD) as required under Section 52 of Republic Act 8371 or the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act of 1997.
In a policy dialogue on Jan 20, 2005 on the registration of CADTs/CALTs with the ROD of provinces and cities, the LRA and NCIP agreed to set guidelines in treating the exemption of CADTs from payment of the contribution to the assurance fund, registration of CADTs embracing ancestral domains straddling more than one province or city, CADTs overlapping titled properties, and CALTs overlapping titled properties.
On Aug. 22, 2005, Joint LRA-NCIP Memorandum Circular 1, s. 2005 was issued for additional guidelines on the registration of CADTs/CALTs with the ROD.
In an earlier city council session, the NCIP-Cordillera has informed the council that a meeting in 2016 between the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Department of Agrarian Reform, and LRA joint national committee resulted in an agreement where LRA required the submission by the NCIP of guidelines on the transfer of derivative titles of CALTs which the ROD should follow and the production of the NCIP of a specific security paper from the Central Bank to be used for that purpose.
In a resolution signed by Mayor Benjamin Magalong on Aug. 14, the city council had considered the information that the LRA will not continue issuing TCTs for CALTs using TCTs issued by the ROD as such is for Torrens titles only.
It added such agreement alleged that without submissions of such guidelines to the ROD, no derivative titles from CALTs shall be issued by the ROD, thus the request for the NCIP guidelines to come up with the guidelines. – Hanna C. Lacsamana
