Defend the Housing Settlements of the Poor.

Implement in-site housing development and mixed land use

in North and East Triangle now!

About 16,000 families live in informal settlements in the North and East Triangle areas in Quezon City. Many of these families have been living in these areas for 30 years now. Many of them grew up, have built their own family and are raising their children in North and East Triangle.

As in other informal and slum settlements in Metro Manila and other urban areas, North and East Triangle attracted settlers because its location provides access to jobs and livelihood for workers, artisans, vendors, and micro-entrepreneurs.

The North and East Triangle residents are economically productive people who, for decades, have been providing housing and essential services for themselves and their communities because the government has been unable to provide such. They have built their own water system, electricity distribution system, small public markets, roads, and pavements. Their spirit of self-reliance and their resourcefulness have improved the community in more ways than any government assistance or service they were provided over the years.

Like the urban poor of Dharavi in Mumbai, they can become property developers or community builders. However, this is being constrained by the fact that the government has not made good on its promise to secure in-site tenure for their homes. Both President Estrada and President Arroyo had promised the residents that their stay would be recognized and secured.

The plan of the Quezon City government to develop North and East Triangle into a commercial district that will spur job creation and increase revenues for the city is laudable. Even more laudable was its effort to consider how best to locate residents of North and South Triangle in the land use plan for the development of the area. With the help of commissioned consultants, it prepared a mixed land use plan for the area under which commercial sites will exist side by side with socialized housing sites to improve the plight of the poor residents. A project called Quezon City Central Business District (QC-CBD) was authorized in 2002 through Executive Order No. 106. The EO creates the North Triangle Development Committee and mandates it to address the issue of tenure of North and South Triangle residents.

Alas, what could have been a model project for urban development planning that considers the right of the urban poor to live in the city and their worth as community builders and potential property developers has been thrown in the dustbin. The plan has changed. The government now wants to convert all of North and East Triangle into an exclusive district for high-end commercial and residential uses. High-end malls, business offices, entertainment parks, corporate headquarters, and residential towers will rise from the area.  The current residents will be evicted and resettled elsewhere.

According to the government, the residents can’t stay: they simply will not be able to afford the rising land values in North and South Triangle. As a “consolation prize” of sorts, it said there wouldn’t be a problem with funding the cost of relocating the residents anywhere. The government will be so loaded anyway, what with the proceeds from the disposition of the valuable public lands.

In response, the residents proposed a genuine mixed land use and inclusive development as a precondition for the success of the envisioned central business district. They expressed opposition to the exclusive high-end commercial development in North and East Triangle involving the removal of the poor for the following reasons:

If “highest and best use of the (government) properties” as stated in the last Executive Order on QC-CBD were to be followed, in-site housing would be the better option than relocating the residents.

It is costlier for both the government and the residents to relocate. The World Bank-supported study confirmed that the original vision of the Quezon City government for mixed land use, involving a plan for on-site housing for the poor through medium rise buildings, is viable and less costly. Under the plan, the urban poor occupying 37 hectares in North Triangle will move to medium rise buildings on a smaller parcel of land.

Further, the rise in land values within North and East Triangle is a result of the government plan for commercial development. This means the government can realize higher net proceeds from the land by developing in-site housing on smaller land parcels, rather than relocating the residents.

Under a mixed land use framework, public lands can be freed for commercial uses without socially costly relocation schemes. Medium-rise structures to house the poor and accommodate social services can exist side by side with high-end commercial districts and city blocks under a policy of mixed land use.

We recognize the drive of the city government to provide for commercial zones to enhance the city’s competitive position vis-à-vis other business locations. But this does not have to be exclusive high-end commercial zones that entail the relocation of the urban poor to areas where social services and livelihood opportunities are scant.

Exclusive commercial development is not compatible with the goal of ensuring an economically vibrant city of the future and with the goals of equity and social cohesion now. Exclusive development and evictions of the poor deprive the city of the diversity that comes from mixed high-end and low-end commercial development and high-end and low-end housing development. Inclusive mixed-use recognizes the importance of diverse human settlements near or within commercial or industrial districts for the economy of the city to become robust, vibrant, and competitive.

Every citizen, informal settler or not, has a right to have humane housing, gainful occupation and access to essential services. The poor finds the opportunities to have housing and employment and gain access to essential services in cities. Where does it say that a city has the right to bar poor migrants from benefiting from the opportunities offered by the city? 

The city, especially the central business district, cannot be resisted. It draws the hopeful to itself, because this is where capital too is drawn. The unemployed continues to have a structural dependence upon capital, which we recognize today as having its own structural dependence upon the city, because the city agglomerates the efficient markets that capital needs to rise higher and higher up the ladders of efficiency.

Urban poor and their advocates around the world are already pushing for a Charter on the Right to the City “as an instrument intended as a contribution to the urban struggle and as an aid in the process of recognition of the right to the city in the international human rights system. The core element of this right is the equitable usufruct of the cities considering the principles of sustainability and social justice. This right shall be understood as a collective right of all city inhabitants, especially those vulnerable and disfavoured, conferring legitimacy of action and organisation in accordance with their usages and customs in the search for full exercise of the right to an adequate standard of living.”[1]

Despite people’s participation in the development planning process being mandatory under the laws of the land, affected residents are not being included in the planning process of the QC-CBD. Until now, residents are still in the dark with regard to the details of the QC-CBD project. In May 2007, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo issued Executive Order No. 620 to speed up the development of North and East Triangle and the Veterans Memorial Area of Quezon City. The order transformed the North Triangle Development Committee into the Urban Triangle Development Commission (Tri-Dev Commission).

Unlike the earlier order, Executive Order 620-A issued on 11 September 2007 reduced the size of the commission.  Not included anymore under this are representatives from affected residents, from the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) and from the Presidential Commission for the Urban Poor (PCUP).

Further, EO 620-A was issued to expand the areas covered by the QC-CBD, to include the Ninoy Aquino Parks and Wildlife. It also mandates the Commission to provide a viable resettlement plan for the qualified informal settlers in the area, which obviously intends to move the poor out of QC-CBD.

For more than six years since it was formed, the Tri-Dev Commission has yet to act on the demands of the affected residents. The San Roque Community Center-North Triangle Alliance, Inc., composed of 16 local organizations with a total of approximately 3,000 families residing in Sitio San, Roque in North Triangle issued proposals for mixed use, on-site development to concerned agencies that are also members of Tri-Dev Commission. The proposals have so far not been considered by the Tri-Dev Commission. Instead, the Commission, through the National Housing Authority has issued a tender for the clearing and development of the area without consulting with the residents.

There have been several attempts by the government to drive off the poor families in North and East Triangle. First, the 24-meter depth road widening rule was used as basis to try to demolish settlements along Agham Road. However, the residents, who were perceived as illiterates, resisted the demolition and demanded due process.

Then there was the dubious tagging and census validation in North Triangle, which the National Housing Authority began in December 2008. The existence of Tri-Dev Resolution No. 6 that we obtained on January 30 during the Inter-Agency Committee Consultation on North Triangle makes us doubt the veracity of the claims of NHA as to why it was conducting such tagging and census validation in the area.  Tri-Dev Resolution No. 6 reiterates the mandate of NHA to formulate a resettlement plan in line with the QC-CBD project.

Moreover, members of the Tri-Dev Commission have repeatedly avoided to talk to us about the QC-CBD plan if not denied that there is already a final plan on QC-CBD. This is another deception. The bidding and the preparation of financial plan/scheme for QC-CBD project is already on-going though.

We believe that government should directly provide housing for the urban poor because this is a basic requirement to bring hundreds of thousands of poor families into the mainstream of our economy and society.

Informal settlers will have a powerful incentive to better their lives and their communities if they are given the security to stay in the settlements where they live and from where they secure their access to jobs and livelihoods and essential services.

1.            Due consultation with and participation of the poor in the Tri-Dev Commission as the government body in charge of pursuing the Central Business District Project

2.            Authorization and implementation of a policy of in-site housing development to accommodate the poor residents of North and East Triangle

3.            Moratorium on the demolition of houses in North and East Triangle and eviction of residents

 San Roque Community Council-North Triangle Alliance (SRCC-NTA)

Kalipunan ng mga Samahang Maralita ng Pilipinas (KASAMA-Pilipinas)

National Urban Poor Coalition (NUPCO)

Claret Urban Poor Apostolate (CUPA)

Institute for Popular Democracy (IPD)

February 16, 2009