Benguet barangay officials recall history, say yes to autonomy

September 30, 2019 Metro BLISTT

LA TRINIDAD, BENGUET – The Benguet Provincial Planning and Development Office gathered barangay officials from the entire province for a Barangay Development Congress from September 3 to 18.

The office coordinated with NEDA-CAR to include a forum on Cordillera autonomy where six advocates from the RDC Speakers’ Bureau discussed the importance of autonomy and the people’s self-determination in the development in the Cordillera given its unique culture and geography.

Peter Cosalan of Atok, the first speaker on autonomy, emphasized that the region’s pursuit of autonomy was not a move against development but an assertion for development to be inclusive. Cosalan recalled the injustices against the people of Ambuklao and Binga who were displaced and improperly compensated for the construction of the two dams in the 1950s and ‘60s.

People saw how the communities of Ambuklao and Binga were displaced to adjacent provinces of Pangasinan and Nueva Vizcaya and as far as the island of Palawan after their ancestral lands were submerged.

Anecdotes also surfaced on how electricity was not even available for the remaining communities near these dams until decades later.

The injustices from the Benguet dams were fresh in the minds of the people of Kalinga and Mountain Province in the ‘70s and ‘80s when a series of dams were proposed along the Chico River threatening the submersion and displacement in Sabangan, Bontoc, Sadanga, and Tinglayan, and other communities along the river.

Opposition to the proposed dams, and the similarly exploitative Cellophil logging project in Abra during the same period grew into a clamor to have the people of Cordillera determine their own development direction.

Clarence Baguilat, as a former DENR-CAR Regional Executive Director, stated that national policies of the past and present neglected Cordillerans right to their land and the customary practices that have proved to be sustainable across generations. While progress has been made in recent years with the Indigenous Peoples’ Rights Act and the Minahang Bayan program, he clarified that the region’s current administrative set-up is less than what can be gained through regional autonomy as mandated in the 1987 Constitution.

The overwhelming votes against its ratification in the past were attributed to a lack of proper information dissemination on Cordillera Autonomy. It can be recalled that Benguet was one of the provinces that voted against the establishment of a Cordillera Autonomous Region in both the 1990 and 1998 plebiscites. Moreover, the Cordillera Regional Consultative Commission, who drafted the first Cordillera Organic Act, saw their bill watered down in Congress and the resulting law was less than what was intended by the Commission.

One of the speakers, Joel Cervantes of La Trinidad, emphasized the need for Cordillerans to be better informed on autonomy and be more involved in the creation of the Organic Law. He shared a 2005 Supreme Court epilogue to the Atitiw v. Zamora case where the highest court in the land stated, “It is hoped that Congress will pass another Organic Act which is finally acceptable to the people of the Cordilleras.”

Over 1000 Benguet barangay officials participated in the Development Congress. A mock plebiscite was conducted and 75% of the participants voted in favor of Cordillera autonomy while 21% remained undecided as they wanted more information and cited that a Cordillera autonomy bill in has not yet been filed in Congress. Participants were eager to support the advocacy with Benguet Board Member and ABC President Melchor Guesey offering to help the Barangay officials craft their respective resolutions urging the filing and passage of the Cordillera Organic Law.

Marlo T. Lubguban, NEDA-SPCAR