DAR Chief urged to relieve DAR Negros official

LA CASTELLANA, Negros Occidental—Farmer-beneficiaries of Hacienda Velez-Malaga in Barangay Robles here have called on DAR Secretary Nasser Pangandaman to relieve Provincial Agrarian Reform Officer (PARO) Stephen Leonidas for alleged dubious acts that created the condition leading to the June 4 shooting incident in which two farmer-beneficiaries were killed.

Jose Rodito Angeles, Task Force Mapalad president, said Pangandaman should immediately relieve Leonidas for entering into an unauthorized negotiation with former landowner Roberto Cuenca, which resulted in a three-month delay in the conduct of a demarcation survey for the 53 hectares where 57 CLOA (certificate of landownership award) were installed last March 22.

“Mr. Leonidas negotiated with Cuenca for reimbursement of the latter’s expenses on the standing crops. He kept telling the CLOA holders not to enter and cultivate their land while the negotiation was going on,” Angeles said.

Angeles said the negotiation was pointless because DAR had three times ordered Cuenca to stop cultivation of the 114 hectares already covered by the collective CLOA of the 122 farmer-beneficiaries belonging to the TFM-affiliated Hacienda Velez-Malaga Agrarian Reform Beneficiaries Organization (HAVEMARBO).

“Mr. Leonidas himself wrote one of the three stop-cultivation orders, but suddenly he was negotiating with Cuenca on the standing crops when the DAR secretary’s order to him was to immediate conduct the demarcation survey after the March 22 installation,” Angeles said.

He said that when the CLOA holders insisted on the demarcation survey after more than two months of delay, Leonidas made himself scarce, that is why they decided to enter their land last June 4.

Angeles further said that during last Wednesday’s demarcation survey of the 53 hectares, Leonidas entered into an agreement with the local Philippine National Police and the Philippine Army contingent to prevent farmer-beneficiaries from cultivating their land.

“After the delineation survey of the 53 hectares conducted in the morning of June 20, Leonidas, together with DAR Regional Director Alexis Arsenal, DAR legal officer Vicky Delgado, and La Castellana Mayor-elect Alberto Nicor,Jr. met with officials of the PNP and the Army who assisted in the survey. Leonidas in a phone conversation with TFM leaders said the farmer-beneficiaries could already enter the delineated area and cultivate it,” he said.

However, when the farmer-beneficiaries started to assemble and cultivate their land, they were blocked by the Regional Mobile Group (RMG) and were told that they would be arrested if they entered the area.

It was also at this time when a driver of DAR arrived and handed over to the farmer-beneficiaries a letter signed by Leonidas and addressed to CLOA holder Pedro Santillan, et al. telling them that the “DAR- PNP and AFP decided not to allow anybody to enter the delineated areas in order to prevent untoward incidents.”