Indigenous Igorots of Cordillera remain squatters in their own land

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By Artemio Dumlao, Correspondent
Published: 00:00 August 18, 2003

A copy paste but worth a lot to me

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They would gaily pose with tourists for souvenir pictures. They are known for wearing g-strings and walking barefoot even on sun-scorched pavements of Baguio City, but what the public doesn't seem to know is that the country's estimated 1.5 million Igorots (Cordillera mountain people) are suffering from "inappropriate" development.

"Our ancestral lands are threatened by so-called development aggression that we consider as inappropriate for our growth a national minorities," Wyndle Bolinget, secretary-general of the Cordillera People's Alliance based in Baguio City said.

Bolinget led an Igorot ritual on Thursday as a tribute to struggling minorities in the Philippines. The UN declared August 9 as World Day of Indigenous People in 1994 as part of the Indigenous People Decade.

A ceremonial animal was slain as "curses" were chanted against "aggressors" of Igorot homeland which include large mines, dam projects, tourism, logging, even official development aid from abroad and government-established special economic zones.

According to Bolinget, multi-national firms are eyeing at least 433,377 hectares of Igorot ancestral lands for largescale mining operations in the Cordillera while at least 13,000 hectares were already approved for mining.

"Igorots will not tire from making endless beating of their gongs until President Gloria Arroyo heeds their demands for protection of their ancestral lands and rights as indigenous peoples," Bolinget vows.

Even UN Special Rapporteur Rodolfo Staavenhagen during his probe on the impacts of largescale development projects on the human rights and fundamental freedoms of the Cordillera indigenous communities last year led to his conclusion that these projects had been devastating with loss of indigenous territories and land, forced evictions, large-scale migration and resettlement.

He also found out that indigenous peoples in the Cordillera suffer from depletion of natural resources, environmental degradation and harassment and violence against those in the communities opposing such projects.

Staavenhagen pointed out in his report that lack of consultation to the affected indigenous communities and not involving them in the decision making process oftentimes bred conflicts.

"Government's prevailing deceptive laws and policies on land and resources under the context of the colonial Regalian Doctrine treat indigenous peoples as "squatters‚ in their own land", Bolinget claims.

Fernando Mangili, secretary-general of the peasant group APIT-TAKO or Alliance of Peasants in the Cordillera Homeland said that the situation of the indigenous peoples of the Cordillera has become more and more severe as development on agriculture driven by the GATT-WTO worsened the already woeful living of the peasants.