On the 17th year of the IPRA: Scrap IPRA and Abolish the NCIP! On the day that marks the 17th year of the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA,) we, the Council of Leaders of indigenous peoples alliance Kalipunan ng mga Katutubong Mamamayan ng Pilipinas restate our position to scrap the IPRA and abolish its implementing agency, the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP.) The correctness of KAMP’s steadfast position to scrap the IPRA and to abolish the NCIP is validated by the sum of the experiences of the indigenous peoples in the Philippines seventeen years of its implementation. Foremost, the IPRA has failed to deter the plunder of our national patrimony and exploitation of our indigenous territories. Instead, the law has eased and legalized the plunder and ancestral land-grabbing of capitalist corporations. For example, in Panay Island, the Jalaur River Megadam Project that will displace 17,000 Tumandok people is well underway despite the blatant refusal of the indigenous peoples to give their consent. On the same note, 20,000 hectares of the Sierra Madre where the Dumagat and Remontado people resist the construction of the Laiban Dam is threatened anew by the revival of the project. The NCIP played no role in stopping the entry of these projects despite the clear and iterant rejection of indigenous peoples. Today, the threat of displacement of indigenous peoples in their ancestral lands is even more ominous as President BS Aquino announced in his State of the Nation Address last July 2014 that he will push for the immediate construction of both dam projects. Through land titles stipulated by the IPRA, formerly communally-held lands are awarded to a few favored people, making our ancestral lands easily disposed of or sold to corporate interests. Ancestral land titling provided by the IPRA destroys the indigenous concept of communal ownership. The commodification and privatization of traditionally communally-held lands has caused division among indigenous peoples, the destruction of socio-political structures, and the degradation of culture. The NCIP has proven itself an effective instrument in peddling and expediting the sellout of ancestral lands to corporate interests. The peoples money intended to protect the rights of indigenous peoples is used to violate the very same rights. In several cases all over the country, the NCIP aided and abetted the encroachment and plunder of mining and energy corporations in indigenous peoples lands. From the creation of fake tribal leaders to the manipulation and gross violation of the Free, Prior, and Informed Consent, the NCIP has disenfranchised us indigenous peoples our rights to ancestral lands, degraded and distorted our traditional socio-political structures, and waylaid us to worse violations of our rights. Based on a grassroots assessment of the implementation of IPRA in various places in Mindanao, where mining projects, agribusiness plantations and dam and energy projects are most abundant, the NCIP played its role as broker and facilitator of corporations and have even spoken in behalf of mining corporations. The NCIP bastardized and distorted indigenous leadership and systems by creating its own system of tribal chieftain, tribal barangay and consultative body to favor capitalist interests. Worse, most of these “tribal leaders” conferred by NCIP are leaders of paramilitary groups that sow terror among the Lumad peoples such as the Alamara, Bulif, Salawakan, and NIPAR among others. In the Cordillera, the position to abolish the NCIP and to junk IPRA is strengthened by the experience of the Igorot people in the shameless manipulation of the NCIP of the free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) for projects encroaching ancestral lands. Manipulation of FPIC in mining projects such as in Bakun, Benguet in favor of the mining application of Royalco, and in Mankayan, Benguet on the expansion of Lepanto, and in big energy projects such as Chevron in Guinaang, Kalinga are a few samples of the disenfranchisement and violations of indigenous peoples rights brought on by the IPRA and the NCIP. Moreover, indigenous peoples forming KAMPs Council of Leaders also condemn the NCIPs idleness, silence, and futility in protecting indigenous peoples from killings, enforced disappearances, trumped-up charges, forced evacuations, attacks on our schools, militarization of our communities and other grave human rights abuses being committed against our people. We hold the NCIP liable for the killings and human rights violations afflicted on indigenous peoples. The militarization brought on by NCIP-facilitated and State-backed projects encroaching on our ancestral lands has caused the numerous human rights violations and killings of our people. Since the enactment of IPRA in 1997, KAMP and its member organizations has called for the rejection and scrapping of the IPRA. Seventeen years after its implementation, the call to scrap the IPRA and abolish its implementing agency, the NCIP, is more resonant than ever. The IPRA neither protects nor defends the rights of indigenous peoples to their lands and self-determination. It is a tool of the State, deceptive and lethal, for plunder and exploitation of indigenous peoples’ territories that serves the interests of the ruling elite and its imperialist masters. IPRA worsened the historical injustice committed against indigenous peoples. IPRA never aspired for the recognition of indigenous peoples’ right of self-determination. In fact, it is the complete opposite. Seventeen years of IPRA is enough. The genuine recognition and respect of our rights as indigenous peoples will only come from our continuing struggle for ancestral land and self-determination. Only through systemic change, that will free the country from state terrorism, bureaucratic corruption, national oppression, plunder and greed will we fully realize these rights, and will be the fruit of the fervent mass struggle of indigenous peoples and the rest of the Filipino people. # Kalipunan ng mga Katutubong Mamamayan ng Pilipinas (KAMP) Panagkaykaysa dagiti Umili a Minorya ti Cagayan Valley (PUNGANAY) Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA) Central Luzon Ayta Association (CLAA) Bigkis at Lakas ng Katutubo ng Timog Katagalugan (BALATIK) Hanunuo Alangan Gubatnon Iraya Buhid Bangon Tadyawan (HAGIBBAT - Mangyan Mindoro) Samahan ng mga Katutubo sa Sierra Madre (SKSM) BAI Indigenous Women’s Network Tumanduk nga Mangunguma Nagapangapin sa Duta kag Kabuhi (TUMANDUK) Kusog sa Katawhang Lumad sa Mindanao (KALUMARAN) Kahugpungan sa Lumadnong Organisasyon (KASALO) KALUMBAY Regional Lumad Organization Salabukan Nok’ G’taw Subanen (SGS) PASAKA Regional Confederation of Lumad Organizations Kahugpungan sa mga Lumad sa Habagatang Mindanao (KALUHAMMIN) (Photos by KAMP)
Posted on: Wed, 29 Oct 2014 09:58:03 +0000
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