DAR panel rejects appeal of Cebu landowner’s heirs

The Department of Agrarian Reform Adjudication Board (DARAB) has rejected for lack of merit an appeal by the heirs of a sugarcane farm owner, who tried to outsmart the government by entering into a lease contract with a businessman to save their 43.3-hectare farm in Cebu from being covered by the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program.

Chaired by Agrarian Reform Secretary Horacio Morales Jr., the seven-member DARAB affirmed in toto the ruling of the DAR’s Cebu office upholding the validity of the collective certificate of land ownership award (CLOA) issued to 12 farmer-beneficiaries.

The 12 farmer-beneficiaries were Paulito Masbang, Artemio Vinalon, Loreto Catarimin, Pacifico Magdadaro, Manuel Masbang, Martino Cortez, Alberto Pepito, Felipe Manto, Esther Sanchez, Artemio Cortez, Pedro Tillor and Roberto Pepito.

The DARAB ruled that the lease contract entered into by the late Albino de la Cruz Jr. and Ponciano Demiar on March 28, 1994 was "null and void for being contrary to the law" because the subject land was placed under CARP coverage on June 21, 1990.

"Any sale, disposition, lease, management contract or transfer of possession of private lands executed in violation of Republic Act 6657, otherwise known as the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law (CARL), shall be null and void," the panel said in an eight-page decision dated Nov. 16.

The panel also directed the defendants-appellants, Diadem de la Cruz, widow of the late Albino de la Cruz Jr., their children and all persons claiming rights under them, "to turn over the physical possession and cultivation of the subject land to (the farmer-beneficiaries) and maintain (it) in peaceful possession and cultivation."

Records showed that the late Albino de la Cruz Jr. entered into a 10-year lease contract with Demiar for the use of his 43.3-hectare sugarcane farm in Barangay Calambua, San Remigio, Cebu on March 28, 1994, four years after the farm was placed under CARP through compulsory acquisition.

The DAR said a notice of coverage and a letter of invitation, both dated June 21, 1990, were sent to the De la Cruz family and that these documents were acknowledged by the landowners’ counsel, Dionisio Flores. It added that neither the late Albino de la Cruz Jr. nor his wife manifested any objection to the notice.

A certification dated Aug. 3, 1994 was issued by the Land Bank of the Philippines, confirming that an amount of P2,117,585.78 was deposited in the name of the De la Cruz couple as compensation for the subject land. — Jose Rodel Clapano