The “Balik Probinsya” Program proposed by Senator Christopher Lawrence Go to address over-population in the country’s urban centers will succeed and dramatically change the urban and rural landscape if it reckons with experiences in previous resettlement programs.
During the Zoom Conference yesterday convened by Sen. Go and presided by Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea, I said that attempts in the past to resettle informal settlers from the urban centers to the rural areas failed because after providing the families initial financial support, including relocation expenses, there were no follow through activities to ensure they would stay.
So, after exhausting the financial aid given by government and finding no other sources of income, the resettled families crept back into the urban centers to rejoin the millions living in squalid conditions in the slums of the big cities.
While I failed to mention this yesterday, there is a success story on resettlement initiated by the late President Elpidio Quirino in 1953 in Cotabato Province under his “Land for the Landless” Program that we all could learn from.
The resettlement was established in Ragayan, an enclave of the Iranun tribe under Datu Amaybulyok Alamada.
Pres. Ramon Magsaysay, who succeeded Pres. Quirino, made the area a resettlement for former members of the Communist Hukbalahap.
The Genio Farm was established in 1954 and was known as Economic Development Corps farm with 863 settler-families cultivating an area of 4,959 hectares.
Happy in their new home, the Huk surrenderers turned EDCOR into a model farm settlement with the greatest per capita productivity.
Today, Alamada is a first class municipality and the resettled families never left and they now call the place home.
By the way, none of them remained Communists and Alamada is one of the towns of Cotabato which was not infiltrated by the Communist New People’s Army.
The “Balik Probinsya” Program pushed by Sen. Go and supported by President Rody Duterte will definitely succeed if the following lessons are considered:
1. The “Balik Probinsya” Program must be supported by a legislation to institutionalize it so that it will not fall victim to the political shifting sands. Without a legislation institutionalizing this, it could be abandoned by the next administration;
2. The program must entice informal urban dwellers with a promise of a better life, rather than coerce them into moving out of the urban slums just for purposes of depopulating overcrowded cities.
3. The “Balik Probinsya” Program must provide the resettled families a “Reason to Stay” in their new homes and this would entail providing them with sustainable livelihood and income opportunities, housing and basic facilities. In other words, government must seriously invest.
This post will be the first in a series of articles I will write about the recommendations of the Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA) submitted to Sen. Go and President Duterte through the Office of the Executive Secretary.
(Photo shows the famous Asik-Asik Falls found in the former Huk Resettlement Area in Alamada, now a tourist destination and top agricultural production area. Other photos show the Zoom Conference which I participated in yesterday representing the Mindanao Development Authority.)
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