CITY OF SAN FERNANDO – The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) said yesterday that the petition filed recently by Hacienda Luisita farm workers before the Supreme Court was “essentially to stop the conspiracy between the President’s family, the Cojuangcos of Tarlac, and the Department of Agrarian Reform in circumventing land distribution in the hacienda.”
The KMP clarified this in reaction to a statement of Agrarian Reform Sec. Virgilio Delos Reyes that the case would only “prolong the agony of qualified beneficiaries.”
“The petition filed by the Alyansa ng mga Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Luisita (Ambala) before the high court to stop the “tambiolo” or raffle draw system of allocating lots and the forcible and coercive signing of promissory notes called Application to Purchase and Farmers Undertaking (APFU) was basically against a conspiracy,” KMP said.
KMP Secretary General Antonio Flores stressed that the move is ”against the continuing social injustice, deception, and oppression imposed by Aquino’s DAR and the Cojuangcos on Hacienda Luisita farmers.”
Flores accused the DAR of “bastardizing and sabotaging the process of land distribution” of the sugar plantation. “Since Day One, the DAR has corrupted the process of Hacienda Luisita’s distribution,” he said.
“As instrument of the Cojuangcos, the DAR itself bloated the number of beneficiaries by including Cojuangco loyalists, decreased the size of lands to be distributed, and intentionally disregarded the farm workers’ demand for collective ownership.
And worst, after deceiving them with a “tambiolo,” the farm workers are being made to swear, in the presence of more than 200 state security forces, to pay for the lands that they already own. All these blatant maneuvers serve the Cojuangcos’ interests,” Flores said.
The KMP maintained that “Hacienda Luisita should be distributed for free and beyond the bounds of the sham Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP)”, as it insisted that “the farm workers are already owners of the more than 6,000-hectare lands that represents their 33.3 percent share in Hacienda Luisita, Inc. under the defunct stock distribution option scheme.”
Flores also said ”this is also the reason why the Supreme Court ordered Hacienda Luisita, Inc. to pay the farm workers a total amount of P1.3 billion because the Cojuangcos illegally sold and profited from the sale of the lands owned by the farm workers.”
He also said that “the outright disregard of the farm workers’ demand for collective ownership would pave the way for the re-concentration of lands at the hands of the Cojuangcos.”
“At the same time, in parceling Hacienda Luisita into small lots, Delos Reyes only preserved the backward, disorganized, and small-scale production that favors big landlords like the Cojuangcos,” Flores also said.
He warned that “The DAR’s actions in Hacienda Luisita are all designed to fail. Just like what transpired in other plantations in the country that were allegedly distributed like Hacienda Looc, Hacienda Roxas, Hacienda Zobel, all in Batangas; and the vast of estates of Eduardo ‘Danding’ Cojuangco Jr. in Negros Island, among others.”
This, even as the KMP also assailed Delos Reyes’s alleged arrogance for his statement that he himself would argue against the KMP’s petition before Supreme Court.
“He is bragging about defending their maneuvers in court when he can’t even face Hacienda Luisita farm workers in a dialogue or even coordinate with them in the distribution process, and disregarded the farm workers’ demands,” Flores said.
Flores said that Delos Reyes should also be held accountable in the case of Hacienda Luisita. “He will definitely have a day in court,” he added.
