NFA denies there is rice shortage in Kalinga

Tabuk City, Kalinga – The National Food Authority (NFA) here denied the allegation of the business sector that this province is experiencing a rice shortage.

The business sector points to the abnormally high price of commodity and the limited supplies of the local rice millers as indicators of the allege short supply of rice. From an average of P900.00 – P1,000.00 per bag of rice is now selling at as high as P1,250.00 per bag.

However, NFA provincial manager Eduardo Mercado asked how there could be rice shortage in a surplus area which harvest 3M bags of palay and consumes only 400,000 of rice.

He also cites the latest survey of the Bureau of Statistics which indicates that there are still 61,000 bags of rice in households in the province which he says is a sizeable volume of rice reserve.

Mercado explains the high price of rice in the province as a result of undisciplined businessmen taking advantage of the situation.

“Due to the drought which affected Northern Luzon from May to August, the planting has been delayed in Region 2 which produces 40 percent of the rice yield in the country resulting in a decrease in the supply of palay and milled rice. With the limited supply, naturally, the law of supply and demand come into play, thus, the higher price of rice. The situation is made worse by businessmen who are not satisfied with small profits setting domino effect. This is a shameful mentality among us Filipinos,” Mercado said.

To remedy the situation, Mercado met with local rice retailers and millers on September 3 to appeal to their conscience and warn them that the NFA will strengthen its monitoring system and apprehend violators. He reported, however, that they have not apprehended anybody until now because, according to him, local retailers are good in hiding their illegal activities.

Mercado also said that they have fielded rolling stores to sell in Tabuk City markets four days a week “for visibility and availability of government rice and also to somewhat dampen the price of rice.”

Mercado said that they must be succeeding because the retailers have been complaining that the NFA is competing with them in the distribution of government rice.

Mercado said that the situation is about to stabilize because farmers in Rizal, Kalinga and also Isabela are starting to harvest their rice crops. **Estanislao Albano, Jr.

WB to repair upper Chico irrigation system

BAGUIO CITY – In the 70’s, the World Bank was set to fund a controversial multipurpose dam but was fiercely opposed by the tribal communities in Kalinga and Mountain Province.

The Chico River Basin Dam Project was halted after thousands of tribal men and women including the revered Kalinga leader Macli-ing Dulag fought the project then pushed by former strong­man Ferdinand Marcos.

Now, the WB is back with the repair of the Upper Chico River Irrigation System (UCRIS) starting soon with a P507 million loan to the Philippine government.

According to Kalinga Provincial Irrigation Management Office (K-PIMO) OIC Alfredo de Guzman Jr., the signing of the agreement between the WB and the government is expected this last quarter. He said the improvement work will be carried out until 2010, adding that the four-year repair of UCRIS will be jointly implemented by the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) and K-PIMO.

Of the total project cost, De Guzman said P378.6 million will be spent on civil works where P218.4 million is allotted for the improvement of the canal system; P93.1 million on diversion works; P36.1 M on drainage facilities; P11.7 million on canal service roads; P15.7 million for farm level facilities; and P3.5 million for project facilities. Read more here...

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Deteriorating education in an improving economy

Quaint is a word to describe Madame Hello-ria Arroyo. I cannot remember any of her predecessors in Malacañang react publicly to the oft-repeated line that the poor cannot feel their administration's claim of "an improving economy." Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t remember it reported that Ramos or Erap made tantrums over reports that the poor could not feel any improvement in their quality of life. Only Madame Hello-ria saw it fit to bitch about it, which is tantamount to telling us to look only at the figures and not mind our churning tummies.

I still recall how GMA rudely interrupted an undersecretary of the Department of Education who was, at the time, the acting DepEd Secretary in the midst of her report. GMA reportedly got irked at the very negative picture being painted by the acting secretary’s report, especially when the latter mentioned that we have a 1:100 classroom to student ratio. At this, GMA reportedly stood up and told everyone present that the report is incorrect and right there and then ordered the acting secretary to revise her report and make the ratio 1:50 based on a two shifts a day computation.

The fact is the two-shift scheme is not practicable in all public schools especially in the countryside. We have full day classes here in Tabuk where we have a 1:70 classroom-to-student ratio in the biggest schools. Having two shifts of classes is also not practiced in government schools in the barrios. They have around 20-30 students (maybe less) in a class anyway.

The above translates to a LOT more than 50 students in a classroom in the population centers like Metro Manila and the other metropolises even with the two-shift scheme. This is so because the figures used in the computation were national figures with no discrimination between urban and rural areas.

What I’m driving at is that the figures insisted upon by GMA do not give an accurate picture of the state of Philippine education. It also reflects a lot on her.

Still on the state of our public school classrooms, I attended a national seminar in Subic four years ago where I met two teachers from Parañaque, one of whom claimed his advisory class had 105 students packed like sardines in a classroom designed for 50 students. I can believe him because the other teachers who were from Northern Luzon claim to have between 80-90 students in a classroom. They all admitted that there were students in their classes whose names they could not match with the right face even towards the end of the school year.

I am pointing this out because the fact that our public schools get more and more populated each year is a sign that less and less people can afford to send their children to private schools in spite of the fact that private schools (most of them, at least) could guarantee a better education for their kids. That more and more parents cannot afford the tuition of private schools, I am sure, is not a sign of an improving economy. Maybe, it is improving. But for whom?

You can talk of an improving economy and cite all the statistics that would back your claim, but all that will be rendered meaningless with a churn of the stomach, which millions of our countrymen get to experience, some on a regular basis. **Bani Asbucan

Demolition order illegal - Task Force Malapiat

Tabuk City, Kalinga – The order of then Mayor Marcelo dela Cruz to demolish houses and huts of alleged squatters in Malapiat, San Pascual, Rizal on June 25, 2007, where nine persons were killed and 10 others were injured, was based on a defective ordinance.

Some of the settlers in the disputed land obtained their lots in good faith but there is a group led by a Butbut tribesman which entered the land through force.

These are the two of the key findings contained in the report of the Task Force Malapiat (TFM), the body tasked by the Provincial Peace and Order Council (PPOC) to get into the bottom of the bloody demolition.

It was learned that Ordinance No. 2005-05 prohibiting land squatting in Rizal does not provide for demolition as a course of action against offenders. It only provides for a fine of P5,000.00 or imprisonment for one month or both at the discretion of the court as penalties for violators. Said municipal ordinance was declared by the Sangguniang Panlalawigan (SP), a provincial legislative body, in its Resolution No. 2005-03, operative on condition that the same be amended to the effect that it provides for summary demolition of illegal structures after due process but Rizal LGU failed to comply with such directive.

Consequently, the TFM has urged the SP not to approve municipal ordinances unless the corrections it has order are incorporated, for local chief executives not to issue demolition orders without following procedural due process, and for policemen to observe rules and procedures in providing police assistance in demolitions.

Regarding its objective to determine the rightful owners of the disputed land, the TFM found the following among others: the existence of a memorandum of agreement dated 1988 between some members of the Butbut tribe with Jeremias Cariaga, Sr., Vicente Felipe and Catalina Lapada allowing the occupation by the Butbot tribe of certain parcels of land in Malapiat; some members of the Mabaca and Naneng tribes bought their lots in good faith from either Vicente Felipe or Rufino Sapote; some members of the Butbot tribe obtained their lands from Vicente Felipe through waiver except the group of Emiliano Macad who forcibly occupied portion of agricultural land awarded to Buenaventura Sarga and his assigns.

In View of the findings, the TFM recommended the reactivation of the Susana Realty, Inc. Task Force (SRITF), headed by the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), and the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP), which was previously created to effect the execution of the court decision on Civil Cases No. 29 and 244,and to include an arbitration body that will resolve all conflicts that may arise in the delineation of the remaining awarded areas.

The TFM also requested the SP to pass a resolution urging President GMA to direct the three agencies to speed up the delineation of the disputed land and release the funds needed for the purpose.

The TFM also wants the plaintiffs and intervenors in the two civil cases, speculators and other claimants of the area who have been selling land that do not belong to them and also squatters prosecuted.

Regarding the findings that the settlers procured firearms in their desire to protect their property rights, the TFM recommended that the negotiation component of the task force to dialogue with settlers to allow the inspection of their houses for possible firearms. The TFM also recommended the establishment of police detachment in Malapiat.

Due to its findings that 31 huts and houses in Malapiat were razed during the demolition and that there are now four unfinished and newly constructed huts in the area, the TFM recommended the placement of the area under the custody of the SRITF and that there will be no construction of houses and no cultivation of the land until the final delineation and resolution of all land conflicts have been accomplished.

The SRITF was able to delineate the bulk of the disputed land and that the Malapiat area is its backlog.**Estanislao Albano, Jr.

(Note: The photo above shows former mayor Marcelo dela Cruz defending his case before the Malapiat Task Force's investigation last month.)

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Estrada guilty of plunder; perjury rap dropped

MANILA, Philippines -- Former president Joseph Estrada has been found guilty beyond reasonable doubt of plunder by the Sandiganbayan anti-graft court and has been sentenced to life imprisonment.

But Estrada son, Senator Jose “Jinggoy” Estrada, and lawyer Eduardo Serapio, were acquitted by Sandiganbayan in its ruling issued Wednesday that capped a six-year trial for the former leader who was ousted in a popular revolt in 2001.

The perjury case against Estrada however was dismissed.

The court said it would allow Estrada to stay at his resthouse in Tanay, Rizal “until further orders.” (Source Inquirer.net. Further story here and at ABS-CBNNEWS and GMA NEWS and other Related stories here.)

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OH! WHEN WILL THEY EVER LEARN...

Two weeks ago, in one morning, I was beating the time to report to office. Along the national road however there was a parade going on, men in a double file formation are moving southward, specifically toward the white carabao monument. Standby I thought for there might be traffic! Suddenly, I noticed pieces of papers, one-fourth the size of a band paper, somewhat thinly scattered under the waiting shade that is dwarfed by an acacia tree. I could say they were placed there intentionally for I could see clearly somewhat a poem printed in them. In verbatim, here are the texts.

THE EVERLY BROTHERS

Where have all the FOLLOWERS GUN
Colt, Elisco and Hydra Brand...

Where have all the FOLLOWERS GUN
To defend their Ancestral Land...

Where have all the FOLLOWERS GUN
To defend that they are not illegal
settler of the land...

Where have all the FOLLOWERS GUN
Heartily donated during Congressional Run...

Where have all the FOLLOWERS GUN
Moving Speedily Ahead the progress of
Kalinga our native land...

And when will they ever learn...
And when will they ever learn...

MAGTAGO TAGO KA NA KALINGA!

At first, gibberish I thought; I could not figure out what message it is trying to convey. After some times, the poem or song that is seems noncommittal about the Malapiat case in the municipality of Rizal, Kalinga province where about 10 alleged squatters were killed during the demolition last June. Such a snafu was the subject of an investigation by an inter-agency task force to ferret out the real score.

Notice the fourth stanza! “Where have all the FOLLOWERS GUN Heartily donated during Congressional Run...”. Whewwww! Incredible!!! According to one media man, a neophyte native Kalinga candidate in the congressional derby for the May 14 elections allegedly donated guns and ammunitions to the Malapiat settlers, specially to members of a warrior tribe, in return of favorable votes for him. If at all that was true then that's it; politicians really contribute to worsening the peace and order snafu in this province.