CITY OF SAN FERNANDO – Farmers affected by alleged “state and corporate land-grabbing” announced yesterday their holding of a two-day fast on January 15 and 16 in time for Pope Francis’ visit to the country.
Referring to the pontiff as the “Pope of the Poor,” the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) expressed “high hopes” the he would “hear the Filipino peasantry’s long neglected cry for genuine land reform.”
KMP Chair Rafael Mariano said the farmers’ fasting “aims to deliver our message to the Pope that under the haciendero President, the State’s character as an instrument of land-grabbing strengthened.” “The farmers’ fasting is not a protest against the Pope.
It is our way of seeking the ears of the Pope and a medium to amplify the farmers’ cry for land, justice, and peace,” he said. The announcement, however, did not say whether the farmers would converge in one place for the fasting. Mariano said the two-day fasting would be led by farmers affected by the P63-billion Metro Rail Transit Line 7 (MRT-7), a Public-Private Partnership project of the Aquino government.
“The MRT-7’s inter-modal depot, the real estate, and commercial development component will be built over productive agricultural lands in Barangay Tungkong Mangga, San Jose Del Monte Bulacan allegedly being grabbed by Araneta Properties owned by Gregorio Araneta III, a rel-ative of interior secretary Mar Roxas and the Universal LRT Corp.
Real estate giants such as SM Lands and Ayala Land reportedly expressed interests in the real estate and commercial component of the MRT- 7 Project,” the KMP said in a statement.
Also joining the fasting are farmers from Coron and Busuanga in Palawan occupying and cultivating 39,238.93 hectares of lands declared by the government, through Proclamation No. 1387, as pasture lands in 1975.
The land is a subject of a long-running dispute between farmers and the Yulo King Ranch (YKR) Corp. owned by Luis Yulo and Peter Sabido, known cronies of Marcos who were able to usurp the lands during Martial Law, KMP also said.
Mariano recalled that “in 2013, Pres. Benigno Aquino III further strengthened the state’s land-grabbing by signing Presidential Proclamation 663 transferring the administration of the more than 39,000-hectare pasture reserve to the Forest Management Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).”
“Pope Francis’ progressive stance on social issues, especially his rebuke of the capitalist order, is already for the poor. Adding his voice to the peasants’ cause is a big political and moral booster to farmers suffering injustice from the Aquino government that have long rejected the Filipino peasantry’s demand for land, justice, and peace,” Mariano said.
