The Cordillera Review Volume 1 Issue 2

More documents

Recommendations

Info

76 The Cordillera Reviewgood. They just threw us down like playing cards.” Their exclusionfrom ancestral domains has made them less visible than ever.When negotiations have ended and people have returned to theirhomes in the ili, they talk about how the new process of fixing boundariesis splitting Kalanguya families apart. This is a different view from thattaken by the intelligentsia. The latter view the present situation of theKalanguya as that of a fractured, invisible, and voice-less society. Toremedy this, they want to create boundaries that will unify Kalanguyaterritory. On the other hand, the Kalanguya on the ground experience itin reverse. While they see the IPRA as offering the guarantee of titledland, they also feel that the implementation of the IPRA and thedelineation of new boundaries is creating friction and fissures amongKalanguya, where there were no such issues in the past. For them, theIPRA affords both a threat to their sociality as Kalanguya as well as aguarantee of their continued and rightful occupation of their lands.NCIP positionalityHaving looked at some of the ways in which the IPRA is implementedat the interface, I would now like to return to the positionality of NCIPofficers and how they influence the assertion of indigenous rights andclaims among ili-based indigenous people. As was observed in theinterface, NCIP officers, ili-based indigenous peoples, and indigenousindividuals in government are enmeshed in the implementation process.The negotiations that would come to bear were often those thattook place between indigenous politicians and government officials atthe municipal and barangay levels. Their involvement both hinderedand aided the NCIP in meeting its targets. Local government officialsextended assistance to the NCIP by sometimes contributing funds outof municipal budgets for transportation and food for participating eldersand community members. However, in many instances negotiationsremained at a deadlock precisely because local politicians refused tocompromise. The NCIP officers would often remind local indigenousgovernment officials that the residents, led by their elders, shouldnegotiate among themselves. But they soon realized that indigenouspoliticians in Benguet each had their own set of elders, to whom theywould turn for their convincing powers at the local level. 25Within local politics, the NCIP officers were by turns praised andmaligned by other indigenous intelligentsia holding public office. Theywere praised for their understanding of indigenous processes and lifeways, since they themselves are indigenous. On the other hand, theywere also frequently accused of confusing and manipulating ili-basedindigenous peoples unfamiliar with the law and the legal processesentailed in the IPRA’s implementation.perez 53-86.pmd761/27/2010, 2:39 PM
Governing Indigenous People 77The positionality of the NCIP as an organization has interestinglinks back to the history of the American colonial period. First, it parallelsthe functions of the Bureau of Non-Christian Tribes, and thus, second,it perpetuates the reified divide between Christian lowlanders and non-Christian uplanders, except that now the uplanders are also Christian.Finally, the NCIP is processing claims that are rooted in the Americanperiod, case in point Kabayan. Not only does the NCIP configure theCordillera region as the natural and rightful territory of the uplanders,just as the Americans did, it is also faced with claims to ancestraldomains that are based on colonial municipal boundaries, rather thanon indigenous conceptions of territorial boundaries.The IPRA’s reification of indigenous ancestry and knowledge doesnot take into account the fact that the elders of today inherited theirknowledge from their own elders who lived during the American period.Seen this way, it is no longer surprising that the elders of Kabayanidentified American municipal boundaries when they were asked todelineate Kabayan’s territory. Prior to the American administration itwas unlikely that boundaries were traditionally conceived of or definedas such. American planners drew municipal boundaries around theirperceptions of “geographic and ethnic factors,” lumping togetherpreviously scattered and independent settlements into a singleadministrative entity identified under one name, such as theMunicipality of Kabayan.The positionality of the individual NCIP officers shifts in relationto the actors that they face. Based on the foregoing discussion, we cancome to the following conclusions about how individual positionalitiesaffect the IPRA’s implementation: First, the officers of the NCIP workunder temporal discipline and pressure to meet targets. They have tocomply with deadlines, donor policies, and project cycles. Thus, in spiteof their primary role as facilitators of a process, they tend to push fordecisions on the ground. This influence that they exert on ili-basedindigenous peoples is done more with regard to the interests of donorsand the NCIP’s own deadlines and system goals 26 than with the interestsof the peoples whose rights they are meant to protect. The power to exertinfluence stems in part from their role as representatives of the state. Forinstance, in the ADBR described above, the NCIP officers influencedthe communities concerned to temporarily abrogate a decision alreadyreached by the ili-based indigenous peoples. This in itself is animposition of power that is tantamount to the IPRA’s intended functionas an instrument of empowerment for indigenous people.Second, the NCIP officers constantly balance between the “we” ofindigenous peoples, and the “us” of government officials. Theyfrequently express pride in their indigenous roots, and in thecommonalities shared across indigenous boundaries. For example, atthe ADBR described above, they proudly explained to me, the outsider,perez 53-86.pmd771/27/2010, 2:39 PM
Page 1 and 2: THE CORDILLERA REVIEWJourna l of Ph
Page 3 and 4: Po licy Inno va tio ns a nd Effe c
Page 31 and 32: Governing Indigenous People 53Gover
Page 33 and 34: Governing Indigenous People 55Bound
Page 35 and 36: Governing Indigenous People 59The c
Page 37 and 38: Governing Indigenous People 63ances
Page 39 and 40: Governing Indigenous People 65had s
Page 41 and 42: Governing Indigenous People 67back
Page 43 and 44: Governing Indigenous People 69At th
Page 45 and 46: Governing Indigenous People 71to co
Page 47 and 48: Governing Indigenous People 73in th
Page 49: Governing Indigenous People 75becau
Page 53 and 54: Governing Indigenous People 79How i
Page 55 and 56: Governing Indigenous People 81NOTES
Page 57 and 58: Governing Indigenous People 83their
Page 59: Governing Indigenous People 85North

The Cordillera Review Volume 1 Issue 2

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?