Following Residents’ Outcry;PMA dismantles barbed-wire fence around 2 camps

BAGUIO CITY — Personnel of the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) started tearing down yesterday the barbed-wire fence which they installed around two military camps here on Holy Thursday, virtually taking some 700 households as Holy Week hostages.

Fenced off with the sharp-edged perimeter wire were the PMA owned Camp Henry T. Allen north of City Hall, and the Navy Base which leads to the Mansion House where the First Family stayed during the Holy Week.

Affected by the perimeter fencing, which the PMA did without consulting the barangays concerned, were some 700 households, who immediately complained about the "hamletting" to Mayor Mauricio Domogan and Rep. Bernardo Vergara.

Domogan and Vergara then frantically searched the city for Maj. Gen. Manuel Carranza Jr., the PMA superintendent, who earlier had given the order to fence the two camps as deterrent to thefts following a series of robberies which victimized even the summer cottage of the Armed Forces chief of staff.

However, affected residents complained that the barbed fence blocked entrances and exits to their homes, forcing them to hold a lightning demonstration in front of the Mansion House to seek an audience with President Arroyo.

Grace Saraan, secretary of Barangay St. Joseph which covers the Navy Base, said soldiers started installing the barbed-wire fence early last Thursday at Purok 7, one of the three communities within the Navy Base. Saint Joseph is composed of seven puroks, and also covers the horseback-riding field.

Saraan said some 300 households, including her own, were affected by the fencing for which the PMA claimed to have gotten a court order.

While Domogan and Vergara were busy locating Carranza whom they were able to trace at the 15th hole of the Camp John Hay golf course the residents themselves tried to bring their plight to the attention of the President, whom they later followed to the Saint Joseph Church where she attended evening Mass, according to Saraan.

Carranza later released a statement in which he apologized to the President and the barangay residents for the incident, explaining that his camp commanders "overreacted to orders to secure the two camps following a robbery, which took place days earlier."

Squatting in the three military camps is a big problem of the PMA, and of the entire city as well. Squatters are occupying the PMA’s formerly picturesque perimeter areas, including its main Fort del Pilar campus.

The PMA leadership brought the matter to the courts sometime in 1996 to 1997, and got a favorable ruling against the squatters.