Hermosa, Bataan”•About 100 village elders in Barangay Sumalo here signed on Thursday a petition asking President Rodrigo Duterte to convert the land within the Riverforest Development Corp. property here from agricultural to industrial.
“We have lived in this land for so many decades. Now, we want our children to live in a progressive Sumalo,” the elders wrote in the petition.
They said for more than three decades, the development of the area is being blocked by a group of “fake farmers” led by Sumalo barangay captain Rolando Martinez.
“They are not genuine farmers as they claim. Their group illegally sells rights of parcels of lot, which is titled in the name of RDC,” the petitioners wrote.
“Sadly, the group of pseudo-farmers positioning themselves as ‘victims’ was able to dupe and got backing from the local Catholic Church parish,” they added.
Martinez could not be contacted for comment at presstime.
In 2011, RDC already started issuing Deeds of Donations of lots to qualified beneficiaries in Sumalo, which was opposed by Martinez’s group, the elders said.
“The Department of Agriculture that conducted a study in 1994 recommended that the Sumalo property is best suited for purposes other than agricultural,” they added.
The petition also said the Supreme Court, in August 2006, affirmed the first resolution of the Office of the President approving the application of the Litton family for the conversion of the RDC property from agricultural to industrial.
Martinez’s group, however, again sought intervention from the Office of the President, according to the petition.
A Regional Trial Court recently approved the petition for declaratory relief of RDC halting DAR from initiating processes to cancel the title of the RDC property for inclusion in the government’s CARP (Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program), the petition noted. Butch Gunio