BAGUIO CITY– Original certificates of ancestral land titles (CALTs) issued by the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP) which were previously questioned by the city government and non-validated 211 titles as well as their derivative titles will not be registered by the Land Registration Administration (LRA) through the Registry of Deeds, a land registration official said here.
Lawyer Guillermo Felipe, Register of Deeds of Baguio City, said CALTs and their derivative titles which were issued by the NCIP covering parcels of lands over parks, forest reservations, ancestral domain claims and those that overlap existing titles of the city government will no longer be recorded under the agency’s computerization program to prevent further complications in the city’s status of lands.
“CALTs, non-validated 211 titles and their derivative titles which were previously issued by the NCIP and were the subject of cancellation by no less than the NCIP will not be registered and will not be legitimized by the agency,” Felipe stressed.
In terms of non-validated 211 titles which were issued beyond the prescribed reglamentary period of February 1987, Felipe cited such titles that did not go through validation pursuant to the provisions of Presidential Decree (PD) 1271 or the law that created the Land Validation Committee have no chance of being officially recognized by the LRA, thus, it will not be registered.
Earlier, the NCIP en banc cancelled more or less 75 CALTs that were initially issued by the Commission covering areas such as Wright Park, Forbes Park, Loakan Airport, Baguio Dairy Farm, and some areas within the Presidential Mansion for having been fraudulently issued.
Mayor Mauricio G. Domogan cited the ROD for coming out with a clear stand on the matter, saying that a number of enterprising individuals who were issued CALTs and are now the subject of litigations over their legality were able to sell the lands to innocent buyers, especially influential personalities in the city and those from Metro Manila.
“We are elated that our crusade to rid the city with fraudulently issued CALTs is being given attention by the LRA in order to rid our city with questionable titles that would further complicate the status of lands in the city,” Domogan said.
The local chief executive asserted the city government is not against the issuance of CALTs to legitimate land claimants in recognition of their ancestral domain but they will not tolerate efforts by some sectors to muddle the worsening land problems in the city by acquiring titles over forest reservations, parks, ancestral domain and other lands that were previously identified for public use.
He cited the city will not allow enterprising land speculators to gain access to existing reservations through fraudulent means considering that the present and future generations of local residents will surely blame them for their failure to prevent watersheds and parks from being titled in the name of purported claimants.
Domogan directed the city legal office to get in touch with the Office of the Solicitor-General in order to consolidate all legal moves to invalidate CALTs and their derivative titles that were questionably issued considering that they cover most portions of the city’s parks and forests.
