News Release
April 6, 2008
Reference: Rafael “Ka Paeng” Mariano, chairman, KMP and president, ANAKPAWIS party list
 
“P43.7 B Agri funds may end up like fertilizer and irrigation funds!”-KMP
Militant peasants challenge LGUs to tell all on irrigation scam
 
The militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) expressed its fear that the supposed P 43.7 billion fund for  agriculture will just end up like the P728 million fertilizer funds, the P3.1 billion irrigation fund and the P 5 billion swine fund, all of which are now either missing or unaccounted for.
 
According to Rafael “Ka Paeng” Mariano, chairman of KMP and concurrent president of ANAKPAWIS party list, “this is a very real danger that we must guard against, while at the same time demanding justice and accountability for the funds that are already missing. We are warning Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and her lackeys that we are watching them,”
 
“As for the P3.1 billion irrigation fund scam, we are asking all the local government units involved to tell all that they know and say if they really received such funds or not. If they did, what did they do with the money?” asked Mariano.
 
“We already have a list of the recipients and they are from as far as Benguet to Surigao del Sur and Basilan. We just hope that they will come clean for the sake of truth and transparency. They owe it to farmers all over the country and to the whole Filipino people who are suffering from a rice crisis that was aggravated by this scam,” said the peasant leader.
 
“We hope that as Congress resumes in a couple of weeks a comprehensive probe on this scam will be underway. In light of the recent revelations of wide scale corruption rocking the country as well as the rice crisis, the Filipino people deserve to have justice,” ended Mariano. # # #