CARP still alive even without funding, DOJ chief says

MANILA, Philippines - The 20-year-old Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) is still alive, though it may no longer have a budget to acquire land for landless farmers, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ). It was not CARP but only the program’s funding that expired, Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez said in a December 10 memorandum to Malacañang. "The very essence of the CARP, which goes beyond the concepts of land acquisition and land distribution, does not justify a myopic view of Section 5," Gonzalez said. "The policy of the law will be effectuated if the period prescribed in Section 5 is liberally construed." Excerpt of his opinion were posted late Friday on the Office of the Press Secretary Web site (www.news.ops.gov.ph). Gonzalez is referring to Section 5 of Republic Act 6657 or the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law (CARL) of 1988. The Section states that: “The distribution of all lands covered by this Act shall be implemented immediately and completed within 10 years from the effectivity thereof." Republic Act 8532 amended the CARL, adding another P50 billion to the agrarian reform fund up to 2008. Thus the said law for the program’s funding was the one that expired last year, and not CARL. Gonzalez admitted the funding cutoff would hamper the agrarian reform program. Thus, he recommended the enactment of a new budget for the program as the CARL provides for funding only up to the end of 2008. "In effect, while the implementation of the program continues, the same can be hampered by the fact that funding therefore will expire by yearend. Hence, there is a need for appropriation of said funds from Congress," he said. In recommending the enactment of a new legislation to fund the CARP, Gonzalez cited the DOJ's opinion in 1997 on the CARL's schedule of implementation (Section 5, RA 6657). A pertinent portion of the opinion stated: "It is believed that the ten-year period of implementation prescribed in the aforesaid Section 5 is merely directory in character." "It has been held that the difference between a mandatory and directory provision is often determined on grounds of expediency. And where a provision embodies a rule of procedure rather than one of substance, the provision as to time will be regarded as directory only notwithstanding the mandatory nature of the language used," the DOJ opinion said. The legal opinion added that the section cited only "prescribes a 10-year schedule of implementation to dramatize the urgency of the CARP which must be implemented immediately and completed, ideally, within the time frame prescribed by law." "It could not have been the intention of the law to prescribe a fixed and rigid period of ten years for the CARP. Such intention would have frustrated the policy and purpose of the law," it added. "It bears emphasis that the ten-year period of implementation is only a time frame given to the DAR for the acquisition and distribution of public and private agricultural lands covered by RA No. 6657. It is a schedule to guide the DAR (Department of Agrarian Reform) in setting its priorities, but it is not by any means a limitation of authority in the absence of more categorical language providing to that effect," the 1997 DOJ opinion said. - GMANews.TV