Residents in Malate, Manila will finally get to have their own lots after 38 long years of waiting, through the efforts of Mayor Joseph Estrada.
In an unprecedented deal, Estrada has secured a purchase deal with the owners of a 2,060-square meter private property in the area that the city government will then distribute to its longtime present occupants under the Land for the Landless Program or LLP.
“As I have promised during my inaugural speech when I was elected President, housing program for the poor families is one of my top priorities. And now that I am the mayor of Manila, I’ve been fulfilling that promise,” Estrada said.
Since being elected in 2013, Estrada, through LLP, has awarded 165 home lots in the city’s six districts.
LLP is based on City Tenants and Security Committee Resolution No. 16-A and Republic Act 409, or the Revised Charter of the City of Manila. Through expropriation, the city government buys private properties that are then distributed to qualified applicants.
“Once the property is subdivided, qualified family beneficiaries will eventually be named and awarded their home lots within the property,” Estrada said during the symbolic check payment and turnover of the mother title of the Adela Tuason Estate Property at the city hall last Friday.
The ceremony formally finalizes the sale of the Malate estate to the City of Manila for P13,526,800.
The Adela Tuason property was represented by Quisumbing Torres law firm, which was named administrator of the estate located along Munoz Street, Singalong, Malate.
The procurement of the lot is historic and significant in the sense that the Estrada administration has managed to convince the landowners to sell the property without having to go through the long and tedious expropriation proceedings in court, according to Danny Isiderio, chief of the city’s Urban Settlements Office.
At P13.5 million, the price tag is cheap, considering the Malate area is a prime property where the fair market value of land is between P15,000 to P30,000 per square meter, Isiderio added.
“This is a product of an expropriation ordinance since 2008, but during the negotiation stage, we achieved a breakthrough: Mayor Estrada has convinced the property owners to cut short the legal process and just sell the land to the city hall, at a low price of just P13.5 million,” Isiderio said.
The lot will be partitioned to at least 60 families who were its longtime actual occupants. They will be given 20 to 25 years to pay for the awarded lots at reasonable monthly amortization rates, Isiderio explained.
He explained that while USO is drafting the subdivision development plan for approval of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the lot awardees will be paying a uniform rate of P500 monthly.
But once the subdivision plan is approved, the land awardees will pay monthly amortization fees based on the measurement of the land awarded to them, Isiderio added.
Early this month, Estrada has identified 470 more families as the next beneficiaries of the land distribution program. For 2017, he has set aside an initial fund of P50 million for the expropriation of the five private estates where the 470 would-be beneficiaries have long been occupying.
One such property is the 28,789-square meter estate that covers the streets of Jose Abad Santos, Solis, and Antipolo in Barangays 215 and 216 in Tondo. The landowner, Vargas Realty, Inc., wants to sell it to the city government at P1.3 billion.