‘Our land is being denied us’

‘Our land is being denied us’

DR. CHANDU CLAVER

BINNADANG THIRD ANNIVERSARY IN TORONTO

(Speech of Dr. Chandu Claver, Chairperson, NOC, BAYAN-Canada, Toronto, 16 November 2014)

“Naimbag nga rabii tay amin”. Good evening.

I am happy to have the chance to be with you tonight on your Anniversary celebration.

One of my tasks in my other role as International Spokesperson of the Cordillera Peoples’ Alliance is to encourage Cordillera migrants to Canada to participate in the broad movement for social change in the Philippines.

Filipino Christian
Fellowship Choir renders meaningful music.

In the pursuit of that task, I need to go around the different cities of Canada where our “kakakilians” are located. In talking to them, I have always held Binnadang as the type of organization that our region mates should emulate.

We need more organizations like yours. We need to organizations that could unite Cordillerans on the need to protect our land and cultural ways. We need organizations that is able to look at indigenous peoples issues but also able to relate to the wider national situation.

The Cordillera Region in the northern part of the Philippines is in the midst of a land crisis at this time. The growing population cannot be supported by the available agricultural lands in our mountains and valleys. As a result, more and more of our “kakailians” have to leave the region and eke out an income from somewhere else – including going abroad for work.

Ricky Esguerra of Panday Sining

But aside from this, the wave after wave incursions of foreign mining corporations (many of them registered here in Canada) and large-scale corporate agricultural initiatives have in addition, violated our ancestral land areas, and constricted more the land areas available to us.

And finally, vicious military operations launched by the Philippine State in our ancestral land areas have repeatedly displaced Igorots from their villages through a never ending reign of terror.

In other words, our land is being denied us.

And what is land to us Igorots?

BINNADANG members doing traditional dance.

We have to remind ourselves that the entire life of the Igorot revolves around the land.

The land has been considered the source of life since time immemorial. The age-old concept is that the development and ownership of land is literally done through the blood, sweat and tears of these mountain tillers

To the Igorot, land is the source of identity, of ethnicity and of collectivity as a people.

To the Igorot, it is not just a matter of considering land as a place to live or a commodity. To us, it is a matter of life. The world view of Igorots, and other indigenous peoples for that matter, takes everything on this earth as integral to life itself.

The waters, the sky, the land, the minerals, the trees, the animals, and the people all interact in order to maintain life. These components cannot be taken separate from each other. They are all parts of one – without one, life is threatened. This starkly contrasts with the mainstream and Western view that these natural elements are considered separate from each other, and could be extracted or exploited without consideration of the effect of such extraction on the other natural elements.

Bridge Cosme and other mainstays of Binnadang

The Igorot Ancestral land therefore, is a source of inter generational livelihood, and a source of collective life. Being such, it is our duty to protect and nurture it. We cannot actually own the land.

As one of our Igorot elders put it, “How can you own something that will outlast you?” This concept shows that we can only be stewards of the land.

This strong connection to the land is similar to the connection of the lowland peasant to the land they till.

November 16 is also the Global Action Day to Seek Justice for the Victims of the Hacienda Luisita massacre. Ten years ago to that day, seven poor farmers were killed and 121 others injured when the military fired more than a thousand rounds of lethal ammunition on unarmed striking farmers of the Hacienda Luisita in Tarlac. Their only crime was struggling for their right to the land that they worked on for generations – a similar struggle that Igorots wage for their ancestral lands. As you know, Hacienda Luisita is owned by the Cojuangco-Aquino clan to which our present president belongs.

It is clear that the Cordillera peasant and the lowland Filipino peasant have very similar problems. It is also clear that for both sectors, the Philippine State and its corporate and its rich Filipino allies are the entities that are working to deny us the use of our lands. It is therefore clear that we have to unite in order to defeat this common enemy.

PHOTOS: HG

An attack on our land is an attack on our life, and our culture as a people – and we should respond accordingly. We lose our lands, we lose our culture and our claim to being indigenous. Without our lands, our cultural ways are meaningless. Remember that our dances, music, attire and other facets of our culture all evolved from our many generations of interaction with the land.

Therefore, an organization claiming to protect culture must also act to protect the land from those entities that want to deny us our right to it.

It is my hope that Binnadang members, as well as members and leaders of other Cordillera organizations would take that perspective to heart.
Thank you. And “Matago-tago Tako Lusan.”