NO FILING OF CASES

THE Dagupan City government will not sue owners of illegal fish pens and simply instead move to dismantle the structures to abate what it perceives to be a nuisance per se.

This is the action that City Legal Officer Victoria Cabrera said will take after sending final notices to owners of the remaining illegal fish pens whose owners claim are standing on submerged private properties, to remove these in three days.

The claims were finally validated and processed by Cabrera, City Agriculturist Emma Molina and City Assessor Roland Suni last week.

Cabrera said their lands no longer belong to them since these are already under water.

Maintaining that lands that had been submerged in water through the action of the river now belong to public domain, Cabrera said the fish pens must be removed or abated as they are considered public nuisance.

Cabrera said she sent the notices upon instruction of Mayor Belen Fernandez through City Agriculture Officer Emma Molina who was expected to report on the delivery of the notices to determine when the three-day notice started.

Molina claims there are only about 40 fish pens standing on the riverbed.

All these will be removed, except the fish pen of one Carcha which is the subject of a pending case in court to prevent the city from committing possible contempt of court, Cabrera added.

In a talk to newsmen, Cabrera maintained that these fish pens should be dismantled right away to abate a nuisance they caused over the years.

This, she said, is an option better than filing cases in court against individual owners of these fish pens that will take many years to resolve, citing her observation as a legal practitioner.

She said Mayor Fernandez who is uncompromising in her stand that the fish pen must go although she understands that the mayor sometimes gives a few days of reprieve to enable pen owners to harvest their fish in order to recover their investment.

She said the mayor already rented a trawl boat to be used in pulling out the bamboo structures deeply embedded in the water.

Cabrera said the city will be at a disadvantage if it will file cases in court as it could mean status quo for these structures pending the resolution of these cases in court. This means their owners can still enjoy the fruits of these structures.

By abating and demolishing these nuisance, we will let the owners file cases and we are ready to defend the city, she said.

“We would rather remove all these fish pens now whether they are still stocked with fish and wait for their owners to file cases against us. If they will file, I will defend the city,” Cabrera said emphatically. “But we have to wait for the report from the city agriculture office, to know when the countdown for the ultimatum started,” she added.

The lady city legal officer said the only time when the city will file a case as a last resort is when the fish pen owners resist demolition, a move that would endanger the lives of members of the Task Force Bantay Ilog. (Leonardo Micua)

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