SQUIRREL AT CSC FOREST

It was almost ten months ago when we featured the CSC FOREST in OLA PRESENTS: THE CSC FOREST . Almost ten years ago CSC played a significant role in government's effort towards economic development as the lead agency in reforesting our watershed areas. After the Office of the President's Office of the Presidential Adviser for the Peace Process (OPPAPP) negotiates the return to the folds of law by our lost brothers, the Department of Agriculture then under Secretary Salvador Escudero III sets in by providing farm to market access roads, planting materials and other developmental projects in the field. The National Irrigation Administration, which was then under General Orlando Soriano provides irrigation facilities while the CSC, then under Chairman Corazon Alma De Leon was the lead agency in reforesting NIA's watershed areas.

In the North, peace and development was attained after a successful negotiation for the orderly implementation of the tunelling of the Casecnan Multi-Purpose Project with "Ka Gerry" of the Bungkalots Tribe in Dupax, Nueva Vizacaya. Waters in Dupax Nueva Vizcaya now spills to Pantabangan Dam in Nueva Ecija. The CSC was the lead agency which advocates to reforest watershed areas allover the country. In Cotabato, the Mal-Mar Project was peacefully constructed with the government entering into a peace pact with the MILF. Gen. Orlando Soriano, was then the concurrent head of the GRP Panel negotiating peace with the MILF. Makmud Mending was then the Project Director of Mal-Mar Project under the Water for Peace project of NIA. Allah Akbar! May his soul rest in peace: Mending, a peace advocate, was killed in a grenade blast in Cotabato after the Ramos Administration.

In Bohol, Gov. Erico Aumentado (then, a Congressman) guaranteed the return to the folds of law of "Boy Simbajon", an NPA Commander. It paved the way for the peaceful implementation of the Bohol Irrigation Project, in Pilar, Bohol. The CSC was the lead agency which advocated for the reforestration of the Wahig Pamacsalan Watershed Area, with Eng. Gene Cacho as NIA's Project Manager (may his soul rest in peace). Secretary Salvador H. Escudero III, in his recent statement concerning the country's food crisis may have been right. It was only during the Ramos Administration were tremendous irrigation projects to expand the country's irrigated areas for agricultural development was swiftly done in a span of two years. It was through the coordinated effort of these agencies that made it successful.

Today, the CSC is presently headed by Acting Chairman Cesar Buenaflor, a career official of the Commission since 1973, a native of Cotabato, the site of Mal-Mar Irrigation Project while Major General Jaime Buenaflor heads the AFP's National Development Support Command, the AFP's Command providing developmental projects to depressed areas. We hope that these coordinated effort in the quest for peace and development continues to address the present food security threat we are now experiencing.

Amid the crisis, however, the CSC Forest represents bounty. Today, a squirrel was sighted in the forest. Snakes, bird and some wild animals lives in the forest. It represents an ideal environment beyond the four corners of a government edifice.

We lost track of the trees we planted at the Department of Agriculture and NIA. It reminds us, however, of the past whenever we see flowers of rain trees blooms as rainy season approaches while we walk along the alley along the Office for Legal Affairs. We can only hope, however, that those trees are now as tall, as big and cared dearly, where squirrels can hide, live and play in peace, like in the Civil Service Commission’s Centennial Forest, presently under Acting Chair Cesar Buenaflor.

The "CSC CENTENNIAL FOREST": a legacy of Chairperson Patricia Sto. Tomas, Corazon Alma De Leon, Karina Constantino-David and now, Acting Chair Cesar Buenaflor.

In memory of Assistant Commissioner Nelson Acebedo.


"THE CSC CENTENNIAL FOREST IN YOU TUBE" :

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