Newspaper Headline: “10,000-strong security force sent off to safeguard barangay elections.”
And the number is for the Southern Mindanao Region only? With such numbers we can assume with certainty that there is so much at stake in the forthcoming barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan polls.
Of course we are happy that these days so many people are already showing interest in serving even in the smallest unit of government – the barangay. Whatever their real motives are, at least the constituents can now be assured that even in the remotest of places there is presence of government.
Some years back when the insurgents were virtually dominating the villages, especially those in the rural areas, even the incumbents were afraid to be known as such because of fear of liquidation or harassment by the rebels.
In fact many barangay officials then left their residences in the villages and took refuge in the city proper. Thus, there were hardly barangay council sessions to tackle issues and problems in the villages.
Today, things have changed a lot as far as electoral contest in the barangays is concerned. Candidates are now willing to splurge money and some even use intimidation just to be assured of winning in the polls.
Probably this situation is now in the consciousness of the country’s security forces and the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) that they have endeavored to do everything including fielding a huge number of policemen, military personnel, force multipliers and Department of Education people to ensure that the voters are secured and that the voting process is fair and beyond question as to its integrity.
*************************
Our friend, former broadcaster and now First District Councilor of Davao City Tek Ocampo, recently visited the uplands in Baguio district to look into reports that new settlers are turning a protected area into a residential community and in the process cutting the remaining trees and further balding the mountains in the area.
We believe that the act of Councilor Tek is a noble one. We are also sure that what he and his team might have observed in the area will be of great help in his desire to craft a local legislation that will put a stop to the incursion of settlers in the city’s remaining green lands and in the process ensures that the environment is protected.
Councilor Tek may also be able to propose ordinances that will help people to remain in the lowlands instead of encroaching in the balding highlands that will likely be eroded much faster when the new settlers do mountainside farming adopting the so-called “slash and burn” method.
Say, if migrating to the highland is already the last option of those who cannot find any livelihood in the city proper why cannot Councilor Tek explore the possibility of helping the new settlers enter into a tripartite agreement with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), the City Government of Davao and the settlers for the allocation of certain logged-over areas for the latter to convert into a new forest and a portion of thereat for farming?
With billions of pesos in income and without any debts from financial institutions, perhaps Councilor Tek, as chair of the Council’s Environment Committee, can propose to the Executive Department and to the SP for the setting aside from the city’s huge budget the amount to be used as “incentive” for the settlers in taking care of the newly planted trees until these can survive by on their own.
Say, under such a project, the city may give incentive of P5 for each surviving seedling after every inspection by a duly constituted body done twice a year for five years. If a new settler is allocated five hectares for a tree plantation alone aside from his area for farm cultivation, and some 2,000 seedlings are planted and all survive for the five-year period agreed, that would mean P10 thousand is assured every six months. And it is over and above what the settler-farmers could earn from his area designated for crops cultivation.
At P20 thousand a year for 5 years, each farmer-settler will earn P100 thousand in incentive. And if there are 20 new settlers getting P100 thousand a year it is a measly P2 million chipped out of the multi-billion Davao City budget. For a period of 5 years and assuming that all the planted seedlings survive in that duration, that would only mean a total of P10 million to be allocated in five years for a new forest creation project.
That certainly is pittance compared to what the city government had spent in the procurement of garbage bins some three years ago that have remained undistributed to where these bins should be until now.
-30-
