This story
was taken from Bulatlat, the Philippines's alternative weekly
newsmagazine (www.bulatlat.com, www.bulatlat.net, www.bulatlat.org).
Vol. VI, No. 1, February 5-11, 2006
Barely Surviving in Sitio
Payong
Sandwiched between exclusive subdivisions and enclosed by walls is Sitio Payong,
an urban poor community. Without electricity and water, health and education
services, the residents of Sitio Payong try to survive. But with the impending
relocation and the unaffordable terms being imposed on them, they might end up
homeless as well. BY
AUBREY SC MAKILAN Peter Mateo’s father,
Santiago, was searching for a place for his family in the 1940s and ended up in
Sitio Payong, Old Balara, Quezon City. Seeing that only a few houses occupy the
100-hectare hilly area, Santiago decided to settle there. He grew vegetables and
palay on the vacant portion. On sloping land, folks grew
bananas, gabi (taro), kamoteng kahoy (cassava), and malunggay
(moringa or horseradish). On flat land, they planted eggplant, squash, raddish,
and okra. They also planted rice during the rainy season. Today, residents sell a
buwig (bunch) of bananas for only P30-50 ($0.57-0.96 at $1:P51.91).
Some sell these as banana cue (fried bananas coated with sugar in
sticks). Some trade it for products they need. To augment their income, men look
for jobs as construction workers. But in the 1970s, a portion
of Sitio Payong was bulldozed allegedly on orders by Loyola Grand Villas (LGV)
developer VV Soliven to build a subdivision. Sitio Payong residents filed a case
of land grabbing against VV Soliven before the Land Registration Authority (LRA)
and the Department of Agrarian Reform Adjudication Board (DARAB) and won. Although some of them
received compensation, the residents were saddened that their crops were
destroyed and part of the land they cultivated could not be restored. The
originally hilly area, which they described as shaped like a payong
(umbrella), hence the name, was flattened. In 1985, the Armed Forces
of the Philippines-Mutual Benefit Association, Inc. (AFP-MBAI) filed a claim on
a 60-hectare portion of the sitio. But they were able to present a title only in
1996. The Philippine Heart Center (PHC) and the Government Service Insurance
System (GSIS) also presented land titles claiming about eight and twelve
hectares, respectively. The land where Peter built
his house was being claimed by the PHC. Peter told Bulatlat in an
interview that the claimants have deployed security guards in Sitio Payong to
prevent newcomers from entering. This has been confirmed by Engr. Lim Tin of the
Housing Committee of the PHC. Last year, residents went
to the Registry of Deeds of Marikina and Quezon City to verify the titles
presented by the PHC and GSIS . Peter told Bulatlat that lands covered by
the titles of PHC and GSIS were located in Zambales and Pampanga. Tin denied this. To resolve the issue, the
residents filed a petition before the Ombudsman last year. Peter said that the
case has not yet been raffled and no one wants to handle the case because it
involves government agencies. Peter said the residents
already spent P13,000 ($250.40) for research and filing of the petition alone. Prisoners Sitio Payong is surrounded
by private subdivisions namely, LGV, Ayala Heights, Capitol Park Homes, and La
Vista, where President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo built one of her houses. A wall was built by LGV to
cover the sitio. Residents then had to climb an improvised ladder to reach the
main street. Peter said, “We were prisoners behind the wall.” Residents of Sitio Payong
fought back by destroying a portion of the wall. Officials of the subdivisions
surrounding the sitio sought the assistance of a special unit of the police, the
Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) to watch over the wall. But Sitio Payong
residents would always find a chance to destroy part of the wall. After a dialogue with the
officers of the LGV homeowners association, the residents were finally given
right of way. An 80-cm opening in the wall was made and a gate installed. The
opening was widened to allow tricycles ferrying residents to pass through. But,
Peter said, a curfew was imposed. The gate is padlocked at 9:30 pm. They are
allowed to go out in case of emergency but will be allowed to come back only the
next morning. No social services Around 500 families are
presently living in Sitio Payong, enduring a life without electricity and water. They still use firewood for
cooking. They use an iron heated by coal for ironing their children’s school
uniform. At night, they use the butotoy, an improvised lamp made of a
soft drink or liquor bottle half-filled with kerosene and with a piece of cloth
as wick. Peter admitted that, at
first, they resorted to tapping power lines from electric posts. But when he
became a community leader and a barangay tanod (village security), in the
late ‘90s, he immediately gathered his co-residents to convince them to cut
their illegal electrical connections. As a result, some
contributed to buy second hand generators that amounted to around P4,000 each
($78.27). A gasoline-powered generator could supply electricity for lighting
four to five houses. A liter of gasoline is consumed for one and a half hours.
Since the prices of petroleum products continue to increase, the use of
generators are becoming unaffordable. At present, there are only about five
generators in the whole community. “Most of the time, we only
use the generator during Saturdays (after pay day) and if we have spare money to
buy gasoline,” said Peter. “Of course, our priority is our food and our
children’s baon (packed meal).” Peter recalled that when
they were kids, they used to walk a kilometer to reach their neighbor who then
had a television powered by a 12-volt battery. Last Jan. 22 Peter and his
neighbors contributed five pesos ($0.09) each to buy gasoline for the generator
so that they will be able to watch the boxing rematch of Erik Morales and Manny
Pacquiao. They could not afford to
buy radios that require at least four batteries costing around P100 ($1.92). The sitio, a mere hundreds
of meters away from the Balara Filtration Plant and the offices of water
companies servicing Metro Manila, do not have water connections. In the ‘90s, local
politicians funded the construction of artesian wells. But residents cannot use
them anymore as the water they get from it is dirty. In 2002, Bayan Muna
Party-list sponsored the construction of two deep wells with water pumps. But
they cannot afford the gasoline for the pumps. For cooking, residents hire
someone to fetch water from the next community, four hills away. They pay P40
($0.77) for fetching the water. But it is more expensive during rainy days when
the road is slippery. Peter said water tankers
with the SB (acronym for Mayor Sony Belmonte’s projects in Quezon City) logo
used to supply potable water to them. But the water tankers stopped coming after
the 2004 elections. Peter said they have
applied several times for power and water lines but these are allegedly being
blocked by PHC and GSIS. He said the PHC and GSIS think the residents will
refuse to leave the place if they are provided with electricity and water.
But Peter belied it saying,
“Dahil kapag ginusto po nilang paalisin ang mga tao sa isang komunidad ay
nagagawa nila at nagiging legal pa ang basehan kung bibigyan ng relokasyon.”
(If they want to eject us, they can do it legally by just providing a relocation
site.) Tin denied that PHC is
blocking the residents’ applications. Tin suggested that probably the homeowners
of the private subdivisions are the ones blocking their application. Meanwhile, Anchie Alvarado
of the Basic Utility Service Section of the Quezon City’s Urban Poor Affairs
Office, told Bulatlat that they have already coordinated with the
electric company, Meralco, and even shouldered some of the costs of the
application. Alvarado said that they are
just waiting for the residents to pursue their application and will process it
again as part of the city’s Depressed Area Electrification Program (DAEP). Because they could not send
their children to health centers or hospitals for check ups, they only depend on
medical missions for vaccinations and detection or treatment of illnesses. Even the education of their
children is a problem. A part of Sitio Payong is near Marikina City but the
latter prioritizes its constituents over those from other places like Quezon
City where Sitio Payong belongs. They had to enroll their children at the Old
Balara Elementary School. But they can hardly afford the fare going to school.
Students try to hitch a ride from private vehicles and trucks passing the area. Unaffordable relocation The residents of Sitio
Payong endure their hardships because they have nowhere to go. Last February 2005, the
Presidential Commission for the Urban Poor (PCUP) organized a meeting between
government agencies, to include the Department of Environment and Natural
Resources (DENR), LRA, Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), PHC, GSIS, and the
local governments of Quezon City and Marikina, and the residents of Sitio Payong
to discuss their relocation. The residents almost accepted a hilly relocation
site in San Mateo, Rizal. Government agencies also promised to provide basic
services. But, Peter told Bulatlat,
they were being asked to shell out P20,000 as “equity or entrance fee.” Tin
however denied this. He said they have not yet finalized the terms for the
relocation site. Peter added that they were
also told that they cannot dismantle and reuse the lumber from their current
houses in building their new houses in Rizal. He said they will be shown a model
house that they have to replicate. “Wala nga kaming pera
kaya ganyan lang ang bahay namin at wala kaming sariling lupa tapos may susundin
pa kaming model sa ipapagawang bahay,”
(We do not have money that is why our houses are like this and we have no land
of our own. And now they are asking us to pattern our houses after a model) he
said. Without electricity and
water, health and education services, the residents of Sitio Payong try to
survive. But with the impending relocation and the unaffordable terms being
imposed on them, they might end up homeless as well. Bulatlat © 2006 Bulatlat
■
Alipato Publications Permission is granted to reprint or redistribute this article, provided its author/s and Bulatlat are properly credited and notified.
Bulatlat
Aside from that, Sitio Payong does not have a day care center, a health center,
or a chapel of their own.