DAR for Suspension of NGCP’s Nabas Sub-Station Project

Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser C. Pangandaman has recom-mended the suspension of all work activities in the power substation project of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines, (NGCP) now on-going in a more than four-hectar e riceland in Brgy. Solido, Nabas, Aklan. The memorandum was sent to Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo coursed through Executive Secretary Eduardo R. Ermita and Presidential Assistant for Western Visayas Raul N. Banias.

Pangandaman’s action was in reaction to the letter of Arthur N. Aguilar, President and Chief Executive Officer of the National Transmission Corporation dated March 11, 2009 requesting for exemption from Presidential Administrative Order No. 226 of the four-hectare ricelands in Solido, Nabas, Aklan where the new Nabas substation of TRANSCO, now NGCP, is proposed to be located.

AO No. 226 prohibits the conversion of agricultural lands into other purposes.

NGCP, has already started to develop the said riceland for its new Nabas substation even before it can transfer the said area under its name and even before the area was reclassified from agricultural to industrial purpose.

DAR Aklan has made it clear and emphasized that the same ricelands can never be converted into other purposes without the exemption coming from the Office of the President. Aklan Provincial Agrarian Reform officer Daniel Y. Martelino has repeatedly warned NGCP people in Aklan of the prohibition.

Pangandaman emphasized the four-hectare riceland is highly restricted from conversion as it is covered with a firm funding commitment to be covered as service area of the Panakuyan River irrigation project. He stressed that in the light and in view of the prohibition and since the project is impressed with public purpose, it behooves all parties concerned to explore all the possibilities and arrive at a win-win solution soonest with utmost regard to agrarian reform beneficiaries affected.

Pangandaman added that it would be advisable to suspend work activities in the subject land-holdings pending resolution of the issue.

Hundreds of workers in the affected ricefarms in Brgy. Solido, Nabas, Aklan signed a petition opposing .NGCP project. /MP