73-year-old ARB’s long wait ends as President Marcos hands over land titles in SOCCSKSARGEN

Eliseo Tuscano, a 73-year-old agrarian reform beneficiary from Matalam, North Cotabato, ended his twenty-five-year wait after he received his land title from President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. during the distribution of electronic titles (e-titles) and Certificates of Land Ownership Awards (CLOAs) at the South Cotabato Gym and Cultural Center in Koronadal City, South Cotabato on May 24, 2024.

He received his Collective Certificate of Land Ownership Award (CLOA) on October 12, 1998, and has since been cultivating coconut, banana, eggplant, and pomelo on the land shared with fellow agrarian reform beneficiaries. With his individual land title for the 0.9117 hectares of farmland, he can continue farming and rearing livestock on the land he finally calls his own. This doesn't make sense because he already received his CLOA. Shouldn't it be an individual title?

“Lubos po ang aking tuwa at kagalakan dahil sa wakas ay natanggap na namin ang titulo ng aming lupa. Makakaasa po kayo na ang bunga ng inyong pagsisikap na kami ay mahatiran ng mga kaukulang serbisyo ay susuklian namin ng ibayong pagsusumikap,” Tuscano said.

Continuing the work begun by the late President Ferdinand E. Marcos, Sr. and Agrarian Reform Minister Conrado F. Estrella, Sr., President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. and Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) Secretary Conrado M. Estrella III distributed a total of 4,351 land titles covering 5,918.44 hectares of agricultural land to 4,271 agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs).

Of the total, 1,184 are CLOAs under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) and 3,167 are e-titles under the Support to Parcelization of Lands for Individual Titling (SPLIT) Project.

Marcos recalled how his father, President Ferdinand Marcos Sr., initiated land reform in the Philippines by issuing Presidential Decree No. 27, which emancipated all tenant farmers, alongside then-Secretary Conrado F. Estrella, the DAR Secretary's grandfather.

“Kaya po kung kayo’y nasisiyahan, kami po ay siguro katumbas na rin ang aming saya dahil po nakumpleto po namin ang sinimulan ng aming mga ninuno at ito ang pinakamahalaga sa kanilang ginagawa,” he said.

Sharing that he witnessed firsthand the