Cancellation of ‘fake’ land titles in Bataan sought

State-owned Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) has filed petitions to cancel the alleged fraudulent land titles that gave at least six “purported” groups of farmer-beneficiaries rights over 192 hectares of state property in Morong, Bataan.

In a statement, BCDA president and chief executive officer Arnel Paciano D. Casanova said the petitions were filed with the Office of the Provincial Agrarian Reform Adjudicator of Bataan to assert the government’s ownership of several pieces of land which were allegedly “fraudulently given away” under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

Casanova said the BCDA wanted the property immediately cleared of illegal claimants to pave the way for the speedy development of the land in accordance with the master development plan for the 356.66-ha Bataan Technology Park (BTP).

BTP, a BCDA owned and administered special economic zone, is being managed by Bataan Technology Park, Inc. (BTPI), a subsidiary of the BCDA.

Casanova said the filing of these petitions was “without prejudice to subsequent filing of administrative and criminal actions against the illegal farmer-beneficiaries and other persons including government officials involved in the grant of the questionable certificates of land ownership awards (CLOAs).”

The BCDA chief said 192 ha, comprising more than one-half of the entire BTP property, were “erroneously, fraudulently and arbitrarily” subjected to the CARP by the Municipal Agrarian Reform Officer of Morong.