BINMALEY-LINGAYEN BAYWALK AREA

SECOND District Rep. Mark Cojuangco delivered a privilege speech at the Lower House on May 6, calling for a House inquiry into the worsening problem of unclassified lands and informal settlements under his jurisdiction, particularly, along the Lingayen-Binmaley Baywalk area.

He wants the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), Department of National Defense (DND), Philippine Army, Philippine National Police, officials of of Binmaley and Lingayen and the provincial government to be summoned.

His privilege speech centered on the approximately 770 hectares of unclassified land fronting the ocean in the towns of Lingayen and Binmaley and “how the DENR has been complicit in the tragedy of powerful and moneyed illegal settlers, squatters occupying much of the said land”.

He said he called attention to the proliferation of untenured occupants along the coastal area of Binmaley to Lingayen Baywalk, in August 2022.

To address the issue, Cojuangco, together with the provincial government called for several meetings with the DENR and the results, and talking points were already reported to the DENR Usec. Atty. Juan Miguel Cuna, the congressman said.

He said the efforts so far resulted in 1). Inventory of untenured occupants. 2). Delineation of the unclassified public land, foreshore and salvaged zone and their relative positions with respect to the Binmaley-Lingayen Baywalk; 3). Mass appraisal and identified 229 inventoried untenured occupants over the said land mass as per DENR survey in 2023, most of which are willing to legalize their application through the filing of the appropriate tenurial instrument.

However, he said no clarification policy direction on these was made by either the Forest Management Bureau, Land Management Bureau and the National Mapping and Resource Information Authority.

“The DENR itself has acknowledged that the gravity of the situation on grounds calls for an immediate, sustainable and policy-driven solution that would counter the emerging social unrest and civil disorder brought about by uncertainties over the tenure of said unclassified public land,” he said.

Cojuangco also mentioned a similar situation in another unclassified land located behind the Philippine National Police (PNP) headquarters and at the northside of the PNP road in Lingayen, “possession of which was lost by the PNP under prior questionable circumstances”.

“Regrettably, there has been no discernible advancement in the case since then,” he said. (Eva Visperas)

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