Pedro B. Camacho said the government should either remove the public structures erected on their land or compensate his family.
He said he has a long-standing complaint against the commonwealth government for using his family’s property without any formal written permission or any form of monetary payment.
Heir to the Nauguman estate
Sixty-two-year-old Camacho is the second to the youngest of six children of Juan N. Camacho, who was one of the children and heirs of Antonia Nauguman’s estate in Achugao.
According to the final probate issued by the CNMI Superior Court, sometime between the late 1890s and early 1900s Nauguman died, leaving her real estate property for her four children, including Juan N. Camacho.
Juan N. Camacho received a parcel of land as inheritance from his mother.
He divided and transferred his inheritance to six of his children, one of whom is Pedro B. Camacho.
Land in question
Camacho said he is disputing the government’s use of his 1,314 square-meter and the 478 square-meter parcels of land in Achugao, which the then-Marianas Public Land Authority, the Department of Public Works, and the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. used in the construction of the portion of Chalan Pale Arnold highway, and the installation of power distribution lines in the area.
Based on Camacho’s certificate of land title, the 1,314 sq. m. real estate property bears the lot numbers 016B05-B and the other parcel, 014B37.
He said the 1,314 sq. m. lot is situated in between two other lots of his two cousins.
Camacho showed to the Variety a map indicating that the two parcels of land are now being used as right of way by the government, where CUC also erected its power transmission lines.
He said he filed an initial complaint with MPLA in 2002 through a letter addressed to then-MPLA Commissioner Edward M. Deleon Guerrero.
Camacho, in his complaint, stated that on Nov. 1, 2002, then-DPW Secretary Juan S. Reyes and then-MPLA Director Bertha C. Deleon Guerrero, wrote to then-Gov. Juan N. Babauta, telling them that the landowner had “submitted all legal documents…for land compensation” for the two lots.
Secretary John S. Del Rosario Jr. of the Department of Public Lands replied to Camacho in a letter, saying “the only documents received are documents for Lot 016 B 05-B” and no supporting papers for the other parcel of land.
Del Rosario also informed Camacho that “the land compensation funds have been virtually exhausted… payment processing will not be possible.”
Probate dispute
Camacho said aside from the certificate of land title, which was signed on Feb. 14, 1983, and the copy of the final probate, which was issued March 24, 1994, both of which he provided to MPLA, the agency also asked him to show a copy of the probate of his deceased brother Juan B. Camacho.
A probate is a legal document that states the estate of a deceased person to resolve all claims and distribute the decedent’s property under a valid will.
Juan B. Camacho had six children heirs to whom he transferred his share of land inheritance.
Pedro B. Camacho told the Variety that MPLA’s request was “impossible” because the document should come from his brother’s children, not from him.
Two of the six children of his brother Juan B. Camacho have passed away already, adding that the remaining siblings now live in the U.S.
According to Pedro B. Camacho. “We only want to let the government know that we are the true heirs. If one [of our family members] dies, we cannot be involved with his share. [He] will be the one to [show a copy of the] probate.”
Proposal
Camacho is urging the Legislature and the administration to act on his complaint, adding that he has no plan of filing a lawsuit against the government because he has no money to spend on legal fees.
“I’m not willing to go to court because I have no money,” he said, adding that he is not the one breaking the law.
Camacho noted that the government has paid some landowners, “but not us.”
In his letter to MPLA, he said: “We demand to be compensated at the set appraised value…which is $500 per square meter — no more, no less.”
Camacho said should the government pay him for his land it should also pay the two adjacent lots to provide the public access to the highway in Achugao.
“Either you pay us, or get your system out of our land,” he said. “There’s a timeline already for us to block the road — that’s my private property.”
Camacho said if the Marianas Public Land Trust can buy private land for its office and if the government can pay other landowners for the use of their lots, “why can’t they pay us?”
