THERE are at least two concrete indications that President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. is seriously pushing the success of the government’s agrarian reform program which had been poster programs of both the first Marcos administration and its martial law regime and the Cory Aquino government that followed it.
First is his idea of condoning the debts of some 610,000 agrarian reform beneficiaries totaling P57.55 billion, which he has endorsed to Congress as a priority legislation. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives worked on it and delivered a remarkably swift passage, the result being the New Agrarian Emancipation Act that only needs PBBM’s signature to become a law, or enough time for it to lapse into law.
Under this measure, individual loans of beneficiaries, including penalties and surcharges accumulated under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP), will be forgiven and written off.
‘The resolution of the land issue is expected to boost the administration’s food security program as farmer beneficiaries receiving lands could now till their land possession, which would eventually increase agricultural productivity. ’
The proposed law is among the priority legislative measures presented by the economic team to President Marcos Jr in a high-level discussion on solutions to mitigate skyrocketing inflation, last March 7, 2023.
Second is the Chief Executive’s directive to Agrarian Reform Secretary Conrado Estrella III at the beginning of the secretary’s term to “address all pending agrarian reform cases,” especially those that have been dragging for years now.
Last Tuesday in a press conference in Malacañang, Estrella happily reported that the DAR has reached a decision on the decades-old land ownership dispute in Tinang Estate in Concepcion, Tarlac, also known as Hacienda Tinang. The case of the Tinang Estate had been pending for almost three decades. It began as a land issue between a farmer versus a landowner and eventually evolved into a farmers’ group against another farmers’ group.
The resolution of the land issue is expected to boost the administration’s food security program as farmer beneficiaries receiving lands could now till their land possession, which would eventually increase agricultural productivity. In a couple of weeks, the Department will distribute 450 land titles to some 450 families in the Estate.
Based on the President’s instruction, Estrella said DAR was able to release the decision on the case, with no one filing an appeal or protest.
Since the matter is final and executory, and nobody questioned the decision, the Department will soon issue a writ of execution, according to the DAR chief.
Secretary Estrella also reported resolving some 1,200 “vintage” land cases as a response to the President’s directive, with most of them being about five- to 20-year-old land cases. According to the DAR chief, they inherited 2,300 cases under the Department of Agrarian Reform Adjudication Board (DARAB), and in the Agrarian Law Implementation (ALI) cases, there are around 2,400 cases.
With the release of land titles, resolution of cases, and the coming condonation of debts, the DAR under the Marcos administration should be making headway in the program, a fitting tribute to the President’s father who first thought of emancipating farmer-tenants by giving them land.
