CABANATUAN CITY – Members of various militant peasant groups in Central Luzon tore a total of 1,000 “faces” of President Aquino on Friday.
This even as they lamented the alleged failure of the Comprehensive Agrarian reform Program Extension with Reform (Carper) and its mother law to address the issue of landlordism after 23 years of its operation here on Friday.
Farmers belonging to Alyansa ng Magbubukid ng Gitnanag Luzon (AMGL), Bayan, Anakpawis and Karapatan from Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Bulacan, Bataan, Pangasinan, Zambales and Pampanga, among others, used a 7" by 11" photo copies of Aquino’s photo with Carper mark to tear for at least three times in the duration of their whole day forum at the covered court of the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) compound here.
Joseph Canlas, AMGL regional chair, said the tearing of Aquino’s photographs symbolizes their protest on the supposed “failure” of the chief executive to institute action that will serve the interests of the farmers. “CARP did not serve the farmers’ interest to have land,” Canlas said adding that even the government is trying to eject beneficiaries from the piece of lands they have received.
CARP was created during the administration of Aquino’s mother, the late President Corazon Cojuangco-Aquino.
Reports showed the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) has distributed 434,545 hectares of agricultural lands to some 263,593 farmer beneficiaries in Central Luzon as of 2010.
At least 41 percent of the figure or 179,366 hectares are in Nueva Ecija where 95,800 farmers reportedly benefitted.
But Canlas described the DAR as “futile trying to visualize with flowers and wonderful colors, farmers smiling while harvesting as a result of CARP and now CARP Extension with Reforms.”
“The DAR figures are very fantastic,” and “mind-boggling,” he said.
Meanwhile, Reynaldo Puno, operations manager of the NIA-Upper Pampanga River Integrated Irrigation System (NIA-UPRIIS) which holds jurisdiction over the covered court that served as venue of the forum, said the permit was given to the group only as “farmers and Filipino citizens.”
He stressed that his office and employees of the agency did not in anyway participated in the activity, he stressed.
Fourth Dist. Rep Rodolfo Antonino who briefly addressed the farmers said that while Carper still has some holes, the extension law has plugged some loopholes of CARP.
This, he said, included assurance that recipients of lands are real qualified beneficiaries. Government officials, he said, cannot just distribute lands to their relatives.
Canlas said the Aquino administration opened both private and public lands to foreign investors for extraction of mineral resources.
Roman Polintan, Central Luzon head of Bayan, urged the Aquino government to distribute to farmers the 6,453-hectare Hacienda Luisita.
He said his group is against the constitutional change that will pave the way for foreign ownership of lands in the country as part of the so-called proposed economic provisions.
Farmers and tribal members in Aurora province, Polintan said, are also suffering from alleged harassment for opposing the creation of Aurora Pacific Economic Zone.
