While walking through the muddied slopes of Pook Arboretum, I followed the sound of jackhammers in the distance until I reached a forest clearing. It was next to a construction site, near the remains of a field once filled with trees. Two towering buildings loomed from the walled site. There, I met 60-year-old Salvacion Tuboro, fondly known as Salvi, holding a machete in her right hand and herbs in her left. 

Grassroots activist and organizer Salvacion Tuboro has lived in Pook Arboretum for nearly four decades and has been fighting for their property rights for 10 years. (Lorence Lozano/Philippine Collegian)

Those buildings under construction, Salvi said, would be their relocation sites.

But residents remain unaware of the provisions stipulated in the P59-million project, bringing uncertainty in their future. Their impending resettlement is driven by the proposed establishment of the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) Diliman. Areas in Pook Arboretum, including Block 2, where Salvi’s farming plot is, stand on grounds essential to the construction of the hospital.

Relocation sites dot the edge of Pook Arboretum, which would house tenants for at least 25 years. (Lorence Lozano/Philippine Collegian)

Because of UP’s increasing pivot toward commercialization, residents’ fear for the future of their homes heightened, seeing how vendors and stallholders were sidelined in the operation and opening of DiliMall.

“Binakuran nga [yung DiliMall] para hindi makita eh. Bigla na lang tapos na,” Salvi said.

UP’s opaque deals have long undermined the interests of communities residing on the campus. Such a trend threatens the remaining forest and farmlands in the city, striking fear into the hearts of the stewards of Pook Arboretum and Pook Aguinaldo.

A Forest Encroached

A residential block in Pook Arboretum, surrounded by trees and plots where residents farm. (Lorence Lozano/Philippine Collegian)

Arbo, as most would call it, is home to at least a thousand families. Portions of it are classified as “protected forest area” under UP Diliman’s 2012 Land Use Development and Infrastructure Plan (LUDIP). Under this classification, its status as the last urban forest in Metro Manila must be conserved. 

Salvi’s residency started in the 1990s when Arbo’s five residential blocks were just sparsely populated. This farmland provided a source of livelihood and a sufficient supply of food. Breakfast would come mostly from the forest, divided among Salvi’s family of four. Kamote and taro are abundant, frequenting dinner plates and the forest floor. With her machete, she proceeds to the forest by noon to gather ingredients and clear space for her farmland, passing through Arbo’s marketplace just before going home.

Salvi lived an undisturbed life until threats of community displacement in 2013 sprung from discussions on creating a botanical garden in the arboretum, which necessitated the dislodging of residents. Salvi participated in demonstrations inside the UP campus and helped nail Arbo with placards denouncing the UP administration.

Following the contestations, Salvi and her fellow residents remained in their homes. This victory was pivotal in pushing Salvi toward more active roles, joining and forming coalitions aimed at protecting Arbo, such as the MAGKAISA Pook Arboretum. She is a mother to both Arbo and her family, fighting for the right to live without fear and harassment from authorities.

The victory,  however, did not last. In 2020, the Board of Regents reclassified 4.2 hectares of the arboretum’s 18.25 hectares for the construction of PGH Diliman and 9.5 hectares for “academic support zones.” Vast areas—once forested—stand as leased and construction sites.

In 2021, Arbo residents protested against UP authorities and formed a small barricade that blocked sections of Block 2 from being accessible. This foiled an ocular attempt that would have outlined the land jurisdictions of PGH Diliman, slowing their construction plans. 

Since then, no clear plan for their relocation has been disseminated to them, even as construction of temporary relocation sites continued. Even the details of the usufruct agreement between the Quezon City Government and the UP Board of Regents, which allows the city government to provide Arbo residents shelter inside the campus, remain largely unknown and unconsulted with the residents.

Many residents are afraid, Salvi said, as demolition threats float every once in a while, prompting Arbo residents to call for transparency from the UP administration.

But Salvi noted that the current administration has yet to convene a meeting for the discussion of their future. Past administrations rarely seemed to engage in good faith anyway, as is the case in another nearby community, Pook Aguinaldo, which happens to be among the last farmlands in the city.

Shrinking Fields

Roosters came to greet me as I entered through several huts tucked within the barely ripe rice fields. It was not yet harvest season, so some residents have been tending to poultry and other livestock. A farmer points toward an even more secluded hut where we can continue our conversation.

67-year-old Jose Bernardino, locally known as Ka Bobby, is one of the remaining farmers in Pook Aguinaldo. He told the Collegian that his ancestors tilled the land long before UP was established. He has seen the lands slowly taken by UP authorities. 

Ka Bobby’s bloodline preceded the development and construction of the UP, with farmers tilling the land as far back as during Spanish rule. (Alex Lauricio/Philippine Collegian)

In the 1990s, portions of Pook Aguinaldo that were once rice fields were taken to make way for the construction of the university’s faculty and personnel housing. These residential complexes—Hardin ng Rosas and Bougainvillea—spanned hectares of land that used to be farming plots.

Before residential blocks were set up in Pook Aguinaldo, the fields were owned by titleless farmers, who had occupied the land long before the establishment of UP. (Alex Lauricio/Philippine Collegian)

Sandwiched between the housing complexes and C.P. Garcia Avenue, Ka Bobby’s farm is one of the remaining fields not owned by UP. Inside it is a kubo that served as the meeting place between him and former UP President Danilo Concepcion. The right to profit on UP soil was discussed, under Concepcion’s assumption that a private farm company was operating in UP.

But Ka Bobby does not run a private company and was already tilling the land long ago.

Cease-and-desist orders by the UP administration were given just days after their discussion in September 2021. Ka Bobby narrated that this came after Concepcion saw the construction of fences around his farm as an indication that a private enterprise was making money off lands that UP deems its own.

The cease-and-desist required them to “harvest their crops and vacate the lands within 60 days.” Ka Bobby raced toward various Department of Agrarian Reform regional offices, going head-to-head against lawyers hired by UP.

“Ang gusto ng DAR, yung bukid ko, ituturo ko sa taga-UP, ‘hanggang dito sakop ko.’ Ayaw pumayag ng UP,” said Ka Bobby, referencing a period during Concepcion’s presidency when ocular operations would attempt to delineate Ka Bobby’s and UP’s land.

UP still insisted on their right to its property, citing its Charter, said Ka Bobby. The dispute only ended once Ka Bobby and his lawyers convened with Concepcion on his farm, where they held a long discussion about KruNaLi farms, clarifying that the land belonged to him and not to any private corporation as has been alleged.

While UP’s guards are no longer as strict as they were since the cease-and-desist order, fears have not yet completely halted as ties between constituents and the UP administration remain strained, serving as warning signs for other communities. 

Institutionalized Intrusions

Such instances of encroachment on communities are inscribed in the policies enacted by UP, following its Charter, which gives UP absolute ownership and autonomy of use on portions of land on the campus. 

Under UP Diliman’s LUDIP, informal settlers are to be relocated on a per-project basis, displacing massive numbers of families depending on the specific land area to be developed.  The UP Master Development Plan, on the other hand, caters to commercial entities by allowing the construction of “university structures and institutions that support entrepreneurship,” which can pave the way to the accommodation of third-party corporations.

In PGH Diliman, it is the private sector that will “design, build, finance, and maintain the Project,” including the provision of equipment and essential services in the hospital.

The existing policies that enable these favors are due to UP’s prioritization of profit generation over its community constituents. “The university should be raising revenues from these properties to support our program,” UP Vice President for Development Daniel Peckley Jr. said during DiliMall’s opening. 

Against this profiteering motive, communities have pushed for the revision of LUDIP through a consultative process that includes affected sectors. 

In a 2023 counterproposal drafted by community formations such as Kariton ng Maralita Network, groups have called for greater democratic participation in the university through sufficient community representation in decision-making deliberations and regular meetings between the Office of Community Relations and sectoral leaders, among others. Communities’ productive activities, such as farming, must also be supported instead of supplanted by the construction of commercial ventures.

Salvi and Bobby’s communities typify the threats entailed by the eschewal of community participation in the university that is propelled by the relentless encroachment of commercialization. Forests are slowly diminished, farmlands converted, and parts of the population displaced. The fight for these communities to exist requires the rejection of UP’s top-down governance in favor of a grassroots-driven administration. ●