Titay Bleyen Santos Unsad of TJG
The Tëduray and Lambangian Indigenous Peoples in South Central Mindanao have a history of protecting and preserving the integrity of Republic Act No. 8371 or IPRA.
In early 2000, when NCIP was first attached to the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), renaming DAR to Department of Land Reform (DLR) thru an Executive Order, Mamalo Descendants Organization (MDO), our Indigenous Peoples Organization (IPO) filed a petition to the Supreme Court against the attachment. Unfortunately, we did not succeed. This was the first attempt to weaken IPRA and clipping the wings of NCIP, followed by subsequent attachent to DENR, Office of the Executive Secretary under PNoy and now to DSWD. NCIP has never given a chance to stand alone as supposedly an independent agency.
Another milestone in protecting the IPRA was our attempt to bury it in 2014 when the GPH and MILF signed the Annex on Ancestral Domain placing it under the exclusive power of the Bangsamoro. We believed that the document will make IPRA insignificant in BARMM. So in order for us to avoid stepping on the law, because it will just be thrown anywhere else, a representative of the Office of the Solicitor General came down to talk to us not to do the burying.
So, we intensely lobbied in both Houses of Congress for the inclusion of IPRA in the BBL, now BOL. Fortunately, we succeeded on that matter. Only Section 30 of IPRA was repealed, which is the IP Educational System.
December 28, 2023
Conducting ecological, environmental studies and cultural researches w/in the IPs' domain w/out proper and genuine FPIC process are illegal extraction of informations w/out the consent of the owners of the domain.
Ecological and environmental studies are in itself a mineral exploration.
This is a blatant ABUSE of their right to Ancestral Domain if the perpetrators are private individuals or juridical entities. VIOLATION of this right if the perpetrators are persons in authority (Officials and employees of Government agencies and instrumentalities) or agents of persons in authority (peace keeping force and protectors of people's lives), who are the duty bearers. Hence, this is both abuse and violation of IPs' human rights because IPs rights is human rights.
Even crafting of laws and policies affecting the lives and welfare of the IPs, such as; Administrative Orders for proclamations and declarations require genuine and proper FPIC process. Much more, the mining operations, establishment of monocrop plantations and issuance of IFMAs and other instruments dispossessing the IPs of their lands require genuine and proper FPIC.
Both perpetrators are violating or violated Republic Act No. 8371, also known as IPRA. This acts are punishable under Section ,72 of this Act.
December 29, 2023
Santos Unsad
Titay Bleyen
Timuay Justice and Governance
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Tlimuay Justice and Governance is the Indigenous Political Structure of the Teduray and Lambangian tribes ascribed as Non-Moro Indigenous Peoples inside the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao duly recognized by the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples of the Philippine Republic.
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