Ambala, backed by the Anakpawis partylist, petitioned the DAR to revoke the commercial classification after the Hacienda Luisita, Inc. (HLI) which is owned by Pres. Aquino’s family, failed to develop the area within the prescribed period of five years from 1996.
It said the area should be covered by land reform.
Anakpawis partylist Rep. Fernando Hicap noted that the HLI instead sold the area to the Rizal Commercial and Banking Corp. and the Luisita Industrial Park, on top of another 80 hectares, also within the hacienda, also sold to give way to the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway (SCTEx).
Hicap recalled that in 2014, the Supreme Court ordered not only land distribution under land reform in Hacienda Luisita, but also tasked the HLI to pay the beneficiaries some P1.3 billion as their share from the sale of the 580 hectares.
Ambala noted that HLI has yet to comply with the payment. Hicap said that because of this, the 50-megawatt solar park project of the Petro- Green Energy Corp. (PGEC), a subsidiary of PetroEnergy Resources Corp. (PERC), within the 500-hectare area in the hacienda should be cancelled. The project is slated to be undertaken in partnership with the Department of Energy (DOE) under a service contract signed last March.
Anakpawis, in a statement, recalled that in 2011, the farm workers set up a farming camp in the area which was however violently demolished in 2013 by “armed guards and goons” allegedly of the RCBC and the Cojuangco- Aquino family.
“Two years later, the solar park project is now being promoted in line with the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) program of Pres. Aquino.” it said.
Anakpawis also condemned the “continued fraudulent programs of Aquino that benefit his family such as the P471.5 million compensation for the lands of Hacienda Luisita covered by the CLOA distribution which was sourced from his Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP).”
