Philippine Daily Inquirer
BAGUIO CITY—The Cordillera’s terrain makes interaction a difficult task for government workers and law enforcers, and occasionally, even for upland villages involved in conflicts.
But technology has aided in bridging divides.
On Thursday, Ifugao Rep. Teodoro Baguilat Jr. mediated a dispute among clans of Abra using 3-D (three-dimensional) maps to resolve a boundary feud.
Baguilat was asked to help negotiate a way out of a boundary dispute between the Maeng tribe of Tubo town and the Balatoc, Belwang and Masadiit tribes of Boliney town. The dispute continues to concern villagers even after the tribes agreed to keep the peace in 1977, and again in 1993, through a “bodong” or peace compact among indigenous northern Cordillera villages, he said.
“Both sides agreed to adopt 3-D mapping, as well as government cadastral surveys, as basis for settling their boundary dispute, thus upholding the bodong,” Baguilat said in a statement.
On Sept. 18, Chief Supt. Benjamin Magalong, Cordillera police director, briefed precinct commanders here about plans to draw up satellite-aided maps shaped by Geographic Information System as part of his initiative to connect all police offices in the upland region to the Internet.
Crossing mountains has not been easy for the region’s policemen, so the Cordillera police office has been looking for open source or free software to help analyze crime data, identify hotspots and coordinate manpower and resources, said Oliver Paculan, a statistician tasked by Magalong to build the police’s online infrastructure.
Magalong said the Philippine National Police would provide the Abra police with computers and Internet connectivity so policemen there could study real-time aerial images of the province and update crime statistics regularly.
Abra is a perennial election hotspot in the Cordillera due to intense rivalries among its politicians, several of whom maintain armed groups.
Paculan said travel through the Cordillera is still difficult.
Reports from the Department of Public Works and Highways showed that the Cordillera has the lowest number of paved national roads in the country, owing to the vulnerability of these roads to heavy rainfall and landslides that are common to the region.
Improvements in communication infrastructure, however, have eased transactions in the uplands, Paculan said.
The National Economic and Development Authority said the Cordillera is now served by 306 cellular telephone sites, which gave Baguio City and the provinces of Apayao, Benguet, Kalinga and Mt. Province full mobile telephone and Internet access. Ifugao has 90.91 percent service coverage, while Abra has 96.30 percent service coverage, according to the Cordillera Regional Development Plan for 2011-2016.
Under the plan, “state-of-the-art information infrastructure (including fiber optics, microwave radio, next generation network) in [Baguio City] is also being established to cater to the growing needs of the BPO (business process outsourcing) industry, e-business, e-government propositions and other electronic-based business outfits.”
The police are also collecting other maps from the National Mapping and Resource Information Authority and the Mines and Geosciences Bureau, which recently developed geological hazard maps for the Cordillera.
“We will put them together for a better understanding of the terrain,” Paculan said.
Maps are also crucial in settling disputes in the uplands, said Baguilat, chair of the House committee on national cultural communities.
He said he introduced the 3-D imaging technology to representatives of the contending villages in Abra as an alternative to national perimeter maps, which display discrepancies in the areas being claimed by the Maeng and the Balatoc, Belwang and Masadiit tribes.
The Tipon ti Umili para iti Panangsaluad ti Nakaparsuan (Tipon), an indigenous peoples organizationrepresenting the Maeng tribe, had asked for Baguilat’s presence.
The talks will resume in October. Vincent Cabreza, Inquirer Northern Luzon
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/276820/anticrime-efforts-go-hi-tech-in-cordillera
abrenian.com 
These new technologies would indeed promise favorable results on problems of crimes against society, but what these high techs has to do with the mindset of our politicians, military, or judicial courts? Would it solve or cure the social ills that had already embedded into our human indignation? What about introducing other forms of high tech that could rehab the mind of the already addicted government workers (elected or not) on corruption, bribery, and other form of crimes?
At any rate, my trust and high respect with the President is still intact that someday thru the unselfish and courageous effort of his righteous subordinates, Abra would finally become one of the most peaceful and prosperous place on earth.
Posted by simon V | September 26, 2012, 10:53 amGradual phasing-out of unauthorized/authorized armed groups that will only protect the vested interests of the few would certainly proliferate local business/tourism industry opportunities especially if initiated by our very own former neighbors presently scattered all around the globe, who have had been dying to come home and help boosts our domestic economy, but it is a just an unreachable dream or a big mistake to dream about it because of the continued/unending refusal of the selected few to give in or by giving us just a little chance to enjoy our remaining life with dignity and respect.
Well, just continue to dream awake as long as it’s free and better than nightmares, that as if we are already enjoying that kind of life we had been missing for from our own birthplace for who knows it would still come true. In the meantime, join me in letting tears flow from our eyes ( hu..hu..hu..ibil..ibil..pang-ngibil tayo?) that stars from heaven might fall and wipe them out. Who will be wiped out? Our tears …kerezy…!
Posted by bagelbel | October 3, 2012, 1:58 pm