The KMP issued the statement after Sanchez- Roxas, assisted by Agriculture Sec. Proceso Alcala, led the distribution of some P611-million worth of agriculture funds and equipment in Tagum City on Saturday.
“Sanchez-Roxas’ campaign stunt before farmers is a preview of a Roxas presidency. Imeldific, deceptive, and corrupt,” said KMP Secretary General Antonio Flores.
“Imeldific” refers to the term coined for former First Lady Imelda Romualdez Marcos to mean ostentatious extravagance.
“Roxas, his wife, and Alcala’s campaigning is tantamount to vote-buying. Worse, they are exploiting the predicament of hapless farmers in a desperate bid to win their votes,” said Flores.
He said “The LP and Sanchez-Roxas’ vote-buying spree bears the indelible ink of the more than P1 billion fertilizer fund scam. The LP’s use of public funds in vote-buying is undeniably sanctioned by no less than President Aquino.”
The KMP called on farmers not to be swayed by LP’s vote-buying spree.
“Instead, the Filipino peasantry must continue to demand for genuine agrarian reform,” Flores said noting that such demand is “not only for the peasantry but for the entire Filipino people.”
“Genuine agrarian reform is about economic development, social justice, and a just and lasting peace,” the KMP leader said.
At the same time, Flores also expressed fears over Grace Poe’s supposed “Danding connection” after she and her slate were announced as being backed by the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC) whose chair is businessman Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco Jr.
“For sure, the NPC endorsement of Poe enjoys the blessings of the country’s biggest landlord and plunderer of the multi-billion coconut levy fund,” he said.
He reminded Poe that “small coconut farmers are still going after the 20 percent coconut levy fund shares in SMC controlled by Cojuangco. He added that big ticket Public-Private Partnership contracts like the Metro Rail Transit-7 project bagged by Cojuangco’s SMC spells land-grabbing to farmers of San Jose Del Monte in Bulacan.”
“Poe’s links with Cojuangco, is actually the second political development that appalled farmers. The first was her totally disgusting statement to make President Aquino, who plundered more than P471 million of disbursement acceleration program (DAP) funds as compensation for the still undistributed Hacienda Luisita, as anti-corruption adviser,” Flores said.
The KMP stressed that “the political and economic quid pro quo between candidates and their political patrons exposes the elections as a farce, a political circus.”
