2 officials still harassing septuagenarian-widow

There’s only one-way to settle the aerial spraying debate: by science. And since the protagonists already brought it to her, President Arroyo can now order state scientists to ascertain their claims.

 In a Dec. 10 letter, for one, the banana growers maintained that they do not aerially spray just any pesticide, but only low-grade fungicide. “The formulation consists of 83 percent water, 17 percent oil, and one percent fungicide, of which the active ingredient is a mere 0.33 percent, while the rest are inert materials,” wrote Stephen Antig, president of the Philippine Banana Growers and Exporters Association. “Per the Lethal Dose 50 Test to measure the toxicity of substances, said low-dose fungicide or LDT is milder than nicotine, paracetamol, caffeine, table salt, Nizoral shampoo or any of the inorganic substances in laundry soaps used daily by millions of households in the country.”

The claims are verifiable. Lab and field testers can check if the spray mix, especially its active ingredient, does cause skin, digestive and blood disease, as NGOs decry.

If inducing even only mild sickness, the chemicals must be banned. But even if found safe, spraying still needs stricter rules. By far planters largely self regulate. Spray time is only up to two hours from sunrise to avoid drift. Airplanes use GPS to precision-trigger off sprayers over 15-meter buffer zones between plantations and communities or waterways. State regulators can set new rules to monitor community health and water quality.

For transparency Arroyo also can order the release of all scientific data on aerial spraying in the hands of state institutions. This must include not only the poisoning study funded by the health department in 2006 that scared the NGOs about the plantation practice. Worth publicity too are two peer reviews — by UP College of Medicine and World Health Organization — that reportedly deem the DOH study defective.

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The Makati register of deeds and BIR district officer continue to hold hostage the real estate of 90-year-old widow Eufemia P. Almeda. Although word has reached superiors, the two officials refuse to re-title old conjugal property in her name. Register of Deeds Dorylene Yara and BIR District Officer-48 Florante de Castro employ deceit and delay. Eufemia needs to sell land to pay for thrice-weekly dialysis and other medical treatment. Her children swear that the duo first harassed Eufemia to make her cough up multimillion-peso bribe. Now they suspect that, in addition to grease money, they want her to also withdraw criminal and administrative cases she filed against the cohorts.

To recount, Eufemia’s husband Ponciano died 1997, leaving her tracts of land and buildings. In Makati are: Marvin Plaza with 27 condos, Almeda Arcade, and a Forbes Park mansion. The inheritances were in the spouses’ names, so Eufemia and children sought judicial partitioning. But first they had to pay estate taxes. Land-rich but cash-poor, the Almedas subdivided Marvin Plaza to sell condo parcels, as ordered by then-BIR chief Guillermo Parayno. After the BIR certified the P256-million tax payment, Yara, then the assistant-RD, issued the main title. A Makati estate court granted the settlement in Dec. 2008, identifying which condos were left to each Almeda. Soon afterwards Eufemia requested Yara to re-title the ones assigned to her. That’s when her troubles began.

As Eufemia’s reps worked on the papers, fixer “Baby” in Yara’s office offered to fast track everything. They ignored her, since all taxes had been settled, and only transfer fees needed to be paid. Besides, Eufemia shudders at the thought of bribing. But for five months Yara’s office gave them the runaround, imposing documentary requirements piecemeal and refusing to accept their submissions. Meantime, Eufemia sold one of the condos and asked that the title be transferred to the buyer. Yara refused, claiming that taxes had to be paid on the building improvements, that is, the condos, for which she already issued a title upon BIR certification in 2004. The Almedas went to the Makati-BIR, which at first said there was no need to pay any more taxes. Then, a bribe of P1-million for each of the 27 condos was floated to them.

Eufemia’s reply was two-pronged. She sued before the Ombudsman, Civil Service Commission, and police for corruption, inefficiency, red tape and malicious delays. She also complained last week directly to Yara and de Castro’s respective bosses, Land Registration Authority head Benedicto Ulep and BIR chief Joel Tan-Torres.

Ulep was weak in dealing with Yara, despite mounting complaints from subordinates and other taxpayers. Deputy Ronald Ortile advised the Almedas that Yara’s staff had no authority to refuse their submissions. In reply, Yara casually denied knowing that Eufemia was seeking re-titling of two condos.

De Castro, upon learning of the Ombudsman case, issued a new tax clearance, as Yara only recently had required. But this was of no use; it contained at least seven erasures and corrections, when the certificate specifically forbids any. When the Almedas complained, de Castro said he would refer the matter to the legal division — for more malicious delays.

Eufemia is holding Yara and de Castro responsible for her inability to seek medical attention because of their delay to issue her land titles. So what, they seem to say?

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“Loving persons are not afraid of being accused as unloving. They have inner reserves that make them love even their accusers. Unloving persons are sensitive to accusation of unloving. They have nothing to fall back on.” Shafts of Light, Fr. Guido Arguelles, SJ

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