THE management of the Davao-based Marsman Estate Plantation Inc. (Mepi) on Thursday accused two officials of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) of misleading agrarian-reform beneficiaries (ARBs) on the issue of the agribusiness venture agreement (AVA) with the company.
Setting aside the AVA will cause the company to stop the operation of one of the country’s biggest banana plantations, rendering around 1,800 plantation workers, jobless.
Mepi’s banana plantation is one of Mindanao’s top-dollar earners, having been the first company to export bananas grown in the country.In a letter addressed to the Presidential Agrarian Reform Council (PARC), Mepi, through its president Anetero Sison Jr., also chided David Erro and Marcos Risonar, both DAR undersecretaries, for their insensitivity to the plight of the ARBs and other workers in the company’s banana plantation.
He said the two DAR officials resorted to “deliberate and organized misinformation” when they held a consultative meeting in Tagum City on March 23 with members of the Davao Marsman Agrarian Reform Beneficiaries Development Cooperative (Damardevco).
The actions of the two DAR officials, he said, were “totally unfair, misleading and devoid of due process.”
Sison said they were not given the opportunity to correct “erroneous and biased statements made by them.”
“Surely, the behavior of the DAR representatives is not aligned with the spirit in which President Duterte would like the pending issues to be resolved, which is that of fairness and transparency instead of misinformation and confusion,” Sison said in his letter also addressed to Agrarian Secretary Rafael V. Mariano.
PARC is the highest policy-making body headed by Duterte as concurrent chairman.
Sison said Mepi is ready and committed to clarifying and present factual and legal grounds to back up its claim, given the opportunity to sit and talk with PARC.
The company is also mulling over to initiate legal action to protect its interest, including bringing the matter up to the Office of the Ombudsman.
The consultative meeting in Tagum was held to discuss whether the AVA between Mepi and Damardevco should be continued and determine the options open to ARBs in case they elect to get out of the existing lease contract. Mepi was not invited to the meeting.
Sison said in his letter, dated March 24, that in the meeting, Erro, who also acts as the PARC Council Secretary, and Risonar, the DAR undersecretary for field operations, told the ARBs the revocation of the AVA between Mepi and Damarbdevco was already final and executory.
However, Sison said the PARC, in a March 7, 2017, letter to MEPI, informed the company it agreed to defer action on the issue and that President Duterte had instructed the DAR to hold consultations with the parties involved “to discuss the intention to continue, modify or rescind the subject lease AVA with MEPI.”
Sison said it is not true MEPI no longer had legal ground to appeal the decision for the AVA cancellation contrary to what the two DAR officials told the ARBs.
“Is not supported by legal grounds as MEPI’s motion for reconsideration has not been decided with finality,” he said.
He belied the claims made by the two DAR officials with the cancellation of the lease AVA with MEPI, the two other ARB cooperatives – Sifabco and Starbenco – may now take over the MEPI farm, describing it as “a patently false statement.”
He said such irresponsible statement “is alarming as it amounts to fomenting anarchy and instigating possible violence” and shows “conduct unbecoming of government officials.”
He said granting for the sake of argument the lease AVA is cancelled, an interim period would still have to be observed by the parties involved to determine the arrangement that will govern their relationship.
Sison said the DAR officials made false statements such as the land originally donated by MEPI to Damarbdevco was made to DAR and not to the ARBs and therefore the ARB need not worry about payment of just compensation to MEPI when the AVA is revoked.
“This is completely wrong as the records will clearly show the land was donated to Damarbdevco and eventually subdivided to the individual ARBs to whom respective Certificates of Land Ownership Award were issued,” he said.
He also said it is not true that ARBs will no longer have to pay for the land when the lease AVA with MEPI is revoked because they have House Bill 555, which bars the foreclosure of their land even with the nonpayment of amortizations to Land Bank, to rely on.
“How can House Bill 555 be used as a basis when it is not yet a law and there is no assurance that it will become a law?” Sison said. “The CARP law also clearly states the Land Bank may foreclose the land in case of failure to pay three annual amortizations.”
2 comments
With leftists manning DAR, this department has clearly gone to the dogs. Rabid pa! Shouldn’t there be punishment for these government officials for inciting to sedition. Come on, these are lawyers!
“is alarming as it amounts to fomenting anarchy and instigating possible violence” and shows “conduct unbecoming of government officials.”
Well isn’t this like the motto of these leftists, create violence? I’m sorry but I don’t think they understand their job, they are supposed to safeguard the well being of these workers/farmers but instead.