BAGUIO CITY—Combined legal efforts by concerned national government agencies, the city government, government-owned and controlled corporations and pro-environment groups will curb the proliferation of squatters in critical watersheds, public lands and even private properties in the different parts of the city, city legal officer Melchor Carlos Rabanes said here Wednesday.
Rabanes, a member of the city anti-squatting and illegal structures committee, said there is a need for all agencies involved, together with the support of the pro-environment groups, to consolidate legal efforts toward the demolition and removal of illegal structures on forest reservations, public lands and even private properties.
“The city government has done its part in filing the appropriate petitions before the concerned courts and quasai-judicial bodies for the nullification of titles that were issued over forest reservations and city-owned properties,” Rabanes said. “Thus, the legal team of other agencies must also do their part in filing the necessary petitions for the lands that they own which were squatted upon.”
For watersheds that are within the jurisdiction of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the city legal officer suggested that the agency’s legal department must already initiate the appropriate legal action before the court or whatever quasi-judicial body concerned for the nullification of previously issued private titles or ancestral titles to portions of those that were proclaimed as watersheds.
He cited that the previous ruling of the Supreme Court upholding Proclamation No. 15 was clear that Busol is a forest reservation, thus, structures, whether or temporary or permanent, have no place within the portions of the forest reservation.