DAR exec assures Nasugbu land dispute status quo

Businesses located on land originally awarded to agrarian reform beneficiaries, or ARBs, are at a virtual standstill while a Department of Agrarian Reform consolidated order to relocate them awaits implementation.

DAR Secretary Conrado Estrella III signed the consolidated order covering three haciendas being repossessed by Roxas and Company Inc.

One of the business owners, among the many who had bought from the ARBs their Certificates of Land Ownership Award, said his fellow resort owners had put all activities on their properties on hold, not knowing when they’d be asked to vacate the area by the DAR.

“Because of that order, we stopped fixing and upgrading our facilities because we do not know up to when we’ll be staying. And because of that, all businesses here are affected,” said the trader, who opted not to reveal his identity.

He said more than 50 resorts in Nasugbu have been paying taxes to the government and providing jobs to the local population.

A land survey showed the resorts occupy 10 hectares, DAR Undersecretary for Legal Affairs Napoleon Galit said. Businesses based in Barangay Aga alone paid P8 million in taxes last year.

No abrupt implementation

Galit, in an interview, said the consolidated order will be implemented slowly, and the status quo will prevail in the meantime.

“Our representatives, particularly [those from] the Provincial Agrarian Reform Office of Batangas, along with the Municipal Agrarian Reform Officer of Nasugbu, will go to the affected barangays to talk to the residents. So while that has yet to happen, we would not allow the properties to be touched until everything is resolved,” Galit said.

As for the motion for reconsideration filed by the ARBs through their lawyer, Mario Cerro, Galit said he could not divulge if it would be granted because the DAR acts as a quasi-judicial body in adjudicating cases.

Earlier, one of the lawyers of RCI, Irene Grace Villadolid, said the firm will heed the DAR’s consolidated order covering haciendas Palico, Banilad and Caylaway.

Valladolid said, however, the company is still willing to sit down with the ARBs and CLOA holders, along with the DAR, to thresh out all the issues surrounding the 2,941 hectares of land being repossessed by the publicly listed company.

“If the DAR will summon us, then we are willing to comply and to air our side,” she said.