This Document was passed on to me by residents of Pangarap Village, Caloocan City, Metro Manila, Philippines. They believe that the series of escalating violence in Pangarap Village has its deeper roots traced back from the time of former Philippine president Ferdinand Edralin Marcos and therefore deserves a space in our cyber world for better understanding.
We therefore encourage the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) to dig deeper into the issues surrounding the relentless shooting happening in Pangarap Village, Caloocan City. I can only shake my head in disbelief. Why did the government continue to allow such violence and abuses to happen right in the heart of Metro Manila? Truly, with these incidences of violence and glaring injustice committed against their person and property, the residents of Pangarap Village can only feel hopeless and helpless amid all these things.
Can you imagine how you feel when your shooters who ransacked your peaceful vigil in the wee hours of the morning, went into a shooting spree and still stood side by side with Caloocan City Policemen neither disarmed nor arrested?
Then another shooting incident happened last Saturday, July 23, 2011 but this time, two people were shot at and killed in the presence of a policemen and still not immediately disarmed or arrested?
As I've said, reading these documents made me shake my head in disbelief.
And to the people who thanked me for receiving these documents, I thank you for your trust. As such, I believe your documents deserved the much attention it needed so this government will lead us all to the Daang Matuwid as it promised us all, regardless of our political color; blue, red or yellow..
I'm posting the document verbatim.
Here it goes.
PART ONE:
In 1935, Commonwealth Act (CA) 161 was enacted by the National Assembly of the Philippines to provide for the establishment of three leper colonies in Luzon. The sum of five hundred thousand pesos was appropriated for the Secretary of Public Instruction to spend for this purpose.
In 1938, Tala Estate was acquired by the government, primarily for a leprosarium, under the Friar Lands Act 1120 with the Original Certificate of Title (OCT) No. 543.
On May 3, 1971, the 808-hectare Tala Estate was reserved for various Government uses, as well as for housing and resettlement site under Presidential Proclamation No. 843. Pangarap Village, part of the said 808-hectare lepers colony was proclaimed as a resettlement site.
On October 1972, a number of employees from the Office of the President of the Philippines, as well as personnel from the Presidential Guard Battalion, including their respective families living around Malacañang Park were ordered to vacate Malacañang Park. These families who subsequently organized themselves and formed the Malacañang Homeowners Association, Inc. (MHAI) were relocated to Pangarap Village.
However, claimants of the said land, who called themselves members of the Consuelo Heights Association appeared in the name of Carmel Farms, Inc. now Carmel Development, Inc. (developer of Consuelo Heights). They were represented by Luis Ma. Araneta, the father of Gregorio “Greggy” Araneta III.
The said land is being claimed by Carmel Farms, Inc. on the basis of alleged Sales Certificates and/or Transfer Certificates of Title issued in its favor, but which certificates were recently discovered to have been illegally issued, contrary to the pertinent provisions of Act 1120 (Friar Lands Act) as amended because of non-payment of consideration andencroachment upon the property of the Republic of the Philippines. (Since Pangarap was formerly part of Tala Estate, its disposition is subject to the provisions of the said Act).
According to the records of the Bureau of Lands, “neither the original purchasers nor their subsequent transferees have made full payment of all installments of the purchase money and interest on the lots claimed by the Carmel Farms, Inc., including those on which the dwellings of the members of Consuelo Heights Homeowners Association stand. Hence, title to said land has remained with the Government and the land now occupied by the members of said Association has never ceased to form part of the property of the Republic of the Philippines, any and all acts affecting said land and purporting to segregate it from the said property of the Republic of the Philippines being, therefore, null and void ab initio as against the law and public policy.”
On September 14, 1973, a year almost to the day after the declaration of Martial Law, Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos, instead of bringing the matter into court, invoked his emergency powers to invalidate and cancel all titles of Carmel Farms including the title of Tuason and the 64 members of the Consuelo Heights Association, Inc., lot buyers of Carmel Farms, and declared Pangarap Village “open for disposition and sale to the members of the MHAI” pursuant to CA 32 (Land for the Landless).
PD 293 caused the following inscription on the titles of Carmel Farms as well as all the lot buyers of Consuelo Heights, Inc. (Ramon Tuason, Tomasa Bartolome, etc.):
“MEMORANDUM. Pursuant to Presidential Decree No. 293, this certificate of title is declared invalid and null and void ab initio and considered cancelled as against the Government and the property described herein is declared open for disposition and sale to the members of the Malacanang Homeowners Association, Inc. (MHAI.)”
However, there is a failure in the implementation of PD 293. The instructions of president Marcos “not to touch the lands already occupied by the present physical settlers” were not followed. The lots physically occupied by the urban poor and some members of Consuelo Heights Association were virtually confiscated by members of the MHAI and subsequently registered them in their names in violation of ACT 1120 (Friar lands Act) which defines the applicant as an actual physical settler “whose dwellings stood thereon.”
It is also noteworthy to say that CA 32 (Land for the Landless Act) was grossly violated by many opportunists buyers composed of greedy businessmen, active high-ranking military officers, active and retired government officials (most of them allegedly coming from the Bureau of Lands and Office of the President) who buy lots in Pangarap Village even if they already owned houses and lots elsewhere. The temptation is too much to refused. Lots in Pangarap Village, since it is sold and offered to the landless and one of the poorest sector of our society (the foot soldiers), is offered at only P2 per sqm.
Again, ACT 1120 (Friar Lands Act) which defines the applicant as an actual physical resident “whose dwellings stood thereon” was also violated because the said lot buyers did not build their dwellings on the lot(s) they have applied and paid for even to this date (one of the many reasons why the Executive branch should and must create a composite team to investigate all the anomalies involving the land of Pangarap Village and/or the Legislative branch to conduct a Congressional Inquiry in Aid of Legislation. You will be surprised to know how many of these title holders are not physical dwellers of Pangarap and are either retired or still active in the government service. Should they be coming from the RD or LMB, are they be the ones causing the delay in the LMB report? Only a full investigation will answer these and the many questions we have).
Deprivation of rights on the lots occupied by other present bonafide occupants ensued. Petitions followed.
After the 1986 EDSA People Power Revolution that toppled the late president Marcos, the Pangarap Village Residents Association, Inc. (PAVIRAI), composed by the urban poor families living in Pangarap, represented by its chairman Alberto Palmera filed a petition requesting the newly installed president Corazon “Cory” Aquino to repeal PD 293.
Then Agriculture Secretary Ernesto Maceda recommended that PD293 be modified instead (Maceda Report, June 26,1988) to include the Urban Poor Families “whose dwellings stood thereon” (non-members of MHAI) as beneficiaries of PD 293 so they, too, can register the lots they occupied in their name pursuant to the provisions of ACT 1120 and CA 32.
In the meantime, the petition of the lot buyers of Consuelo Heights is gaining momentum in the proper courts.
Even before the government can act on the Maceda Report, the Supreme Court in its January 29, 1988 Decision (G.R. No. 70484 in the Roman Tuason vs. the Register of Deeds) declared PD 293 as “unconstitutional and voib ab initio in all its parts.”
The Supreme Court Decision (G.R. No. 70484):
· Contained an injunctive writ invalidating all sales certificates and transfer certificates issued under the PD 293
· Ordered the Register of Deeds of Caloocan City to restore to full effect and efficacy the titles of the Tuasons and the 64 members of Consuelo Heights, Inc. (causing the removal of the aforementioned inscription on all the titles of the Tuasons and the 64 Intervenors only, being party to the case)
· And ordered the public respondents to refrain, cease and desist from implementing any provision or part of PD 293.
However, with respect to the title of Carmel and the purchases of lots from its original title by the petitioner and petitioner in intervention, the Supreme Court in its decision stated that:
· the government may “bring suit to recover the unpaid installments and interest, invalidate any sale or encumbrance involving the land subject of the sale, and enforce the lien of the Government against the land by selling the same in the manner provided by Act Numbered One Hundred and Ninety for the foreclosure of mortgages. This it can do, despite the lapse of a considerable period of time. Prescription does not lie against the Government.”
· “until and unless such a suit is brought and results in a judgment favorable to the Government, the acquisition of title by Carmel and the purchases by the petitioners and the petitioners-intervenors from it of portions of the land covered by its original title must be respected.”
· “at any rate, the eventuation of that contingency will not and cannot in any manner affect this Court’s conclusion, herein affirmed, of the unconstitutionality and invalidity of Presidential Decree No. 293, and the absolute lack of any right to the land or any portion thereof on the part of the members of the so-called ‘Malacanang Homeowners Association, Inc.’”
However, during the Committee Hearing conducted by the House Committee on Justice presided by Rep. Libanan, Carmel stipulated that they did not buy their lots from the government contrary to what appeared in the Supreme Court Decision GR No. 70484, and that they are a third-party buyer (meaning that their lots came from Ildefonso Villareal and Paquita Eusebio).
The Supreme Court Decision, however, did not categorically cleared the following issues:
· Whether all titles issued under PD 293 are considered null and void
· Whether all titles issued under PD 293 are already cancelled
· Whether the “absolute lack of any right to the land or any portion thereof on the part of the members of the so-called “Malacanang Homeowners Association, Inc.” refers only to the members of MHAI who occupied the lots of the Tuasons and the 64 Intervenors or it refers to ALL members of MHAI even those whose dwelling stood on the vacant lots of Pangarap under ACT 1120 and CA 32.
Note that the decision did not even categorically direct the Register of Deeds to recall all titles
issued under PD293 and cancel them accordingly.
It is also noteworthy to mention that:
1. The Supreme Court, in its letter addressed to Sen. Aquilino “Nene” Pimentel’s Law Office, certified that “Carmel Farms, Inc. was not a petitioner nor a petitioner-in-intervention in the above-entitled case.“
2. Yolanda Alfonso of the Register of Deeds, Caloocan City in her letter addressed to AQUILINO Q. PIMENTEL, JR. dated Nov. 19, 1996, certified that:
a. There is no letter request from Carmel farms for the revival of their TCT’s and
b. There is likewise no corresponding entry number and date of actual revival of TCT’s
Therefore:
· Carmel’s TCTs were not acquired from the government
· Carmel is not a party to the case aforementioned and technically not a beneficiary to the case won by the Tuasons and the 64 Intervenors
· Carmel’s TCTs remain cancelled (no request for the revival of their titles and no corresponding entry number and date of revival)
Despite the facts mentioned above, Carmel Farms, represented by Atty. Orlando Rayos, filed PD772 (Anti-Squatting) in 1994 against most residents of Pangarap (both the title holders and the urban poor dwellers).
Close scrutiny of the titles of Carmel will show that despite the fact that it did not apply for the revival of their titles, the inscription declaring it null and void was removed in 1989 by a certain Yolanda Alfonso. The reason why Carmel was able to file charges to the residents of Pangarap.
How can the removal of the inscriptions canceling the title of Carmel was done by one Yolanda Alfonso in 1989 when in fact it was Rodolfo Romero who was the RD of Caloocan at that time? Alfonso was the RD of Manila.
