Land cultivation campaign spreads like fire in Negros Island

In Manila, a forum about

the Experience of the Peasant Struggle in Negros  and Hacienda Luisita and How they have Transformed Lands into A Major Source of Food and Livelihood
 

Featuring the
· Testimonies of farmers who used to work at sugarlands from Negros and Hacienda Luisita
· Critique of Carper
 Highlights and features of the House Bill 374 or Genuine Agrarian Reform Bill (GARB)

Sponsored by

KMP-Negros, United Luisita Workers Union (ULWU), 

Alyansa ng mga Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Luisita (AMBALA),

 ANAKPAWIS Party List, Rural Missionaries of the Philippines (RMP)

De Meester Hall,St Theresa’s College, D. Tuazon, Quezon City

Oct. 27, 2010

 

The Filipino Peasants Struggle for Land is a noble cause to Uplift them from Poverty and Hunger, Produce Food for Man and Free them from the Bondage of Feudal Control of the Few Rich and Powerful Landlords.

A forum about the Experience of the Peasant Struggle in Negros and Hacienda Luisita and How they have Transformed Lands into A Major Source of Food and Livelihood

Brief Background
The Fruits of the Struggle for Land

On November 6, 2004, farmworkers from Hacienda Luisita launched their strike against the Stock Distribution Option (SDO) that they saw kept them in poverty and misery. They were massacred on November 16, but they stood their ground. They continued their struggle and began cultivating vast lands with crops such as rice, vegetables and fruits. The lands that for many decades have only been planted with sugarcane and only served the demands for sugar of the world market has for the first time served the farmworkers who toiled heavily on it. It was the moment that man and land have concerted in existence. Land served the man’s needs and provided them with food and source of livelihood. Both land and man were liberated.

At present, at least 2,000 hectares were planted with rice by the farmworkers, with hundreds more for fruits and vegetables. This is the very CONCRETIZATION OF GENUINE LAND REFORM. THE STRUGGLE IN HACIENDA LUISITA IS A MODEL STRUGGLE FOR ALL FILIPINO LANDLESS PEASANTS TO BE INSPIRED WITH.

About 5 years ago, when liberalization of agriculture took its toll to the local sugar industry, hundreds of thousands of sugar farmworkers were affected by the declining demand for Philippine sugar, resulting the corresponding decline for the opportunity to work in the Negros island. Those farmworkers who were earning P50 to P80 per day, alongwith the “sakadas” who earn much lower, have finally learned that the feudal control of sugar barons pulled them down to poverty.

With the inspiration of struggle for Genuine Land Reform in other regions, they launched their “Bungkalan” (cultivation) campaign, converting idle lands that used to be sugarlands into rice farms and for vegetables and fruits. They have also set-up their tent cities in order to protect each other from the possible harassments of landlords and landgrabbers. From only a few hectares, to 2,000 hectares a year after, up to 6,000 hectares across Negros, farmers have finally brought out the full potential of the land from only serving the interests of a few landlords into serving the interest of tens to hundreds of thousands farmworker families.

Farmers from both regions are now defending their concrete victories. At present, Hacienda Luisita farmers are being deceived by the Cojuangco-Aquinos into agreeing with a compromise deal that is essentially within the framework of the SDO. Moreover, leaders and members of peasant organizations in Negros are being accused of crimes such as trespassing, arson, malicious mischief and more. They are now facing criminalization of agrarian cases.

Their rich experience in struggle for land is the living proof that land and man should exist in harmony, free from greed of a few landlords and serving the people. Their struggle is democracy at work, real democracy led by the people, thus, they are worthy of our support and solidarity.
.

Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas - Southern Mindanao Region (KMP-SMR)
Press Statement
October 24, 2010
October Peasant Month
 

Situation of Farmers in Davao, Mindanao detailed in situationer

As landlessness, hunger, militarization, and rights abuses mark the plight of the Filipino farmers, we from local peoples organizations under the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP – Southern Mindanao) affirm our unwavering commitment to advance the struggle for genuine agrarian reform, food sovereignty, social justice, and national patrimony.

The first 100 days of the Aquino administration have affirmed the fears of the peasantry that the P-Noy Administration has no heart nor the political intent to uplift the plight of the farmers.

Despite its avowals of revitalizing the agricultural industry, the Aquino administration has no concrete policies that are being implemented to reverse the past administration’s economic and political mistakes. The Arroyo regime has put in place the mechanisms for the demise of the local agricultural industry, the dis-empowerment of the Filipino farmers, and the violations of their basic human rights.

Instead, the Aquino administration’s 20–year peace and development road-map, which identifies energy generation, “responsible” mining, aqua and marine culture, and infrastructure all foretell that this policy hence, is no different from the Arroyo administration’s creation of Mindanao as a super region.

This road-map will further subject the farmers and the local agricultural industry into a deep crisis and will further undermine their right to land and to life.

The massive conversion of agricultural lands into mono-crop plantations for agri-business ventures of transnational corporations such as Del Monte, DOLE, STANFILCO, LA PANDAY, to name a few, have turned self – reliant farmers and village economies like “slaves” to foreign corporations. As of 2005, 26,000 hectares of agricultural lands have been documented to have been converted into banana plantations while more than 40,000 (estimated figure based on 91% production share of Mindanao in pineapple prod & the 70,000 has land allotted to pineapple in the country) hectares were converted into pineapple plantations and processing plants.

Contract growership agreements have only favored the profit – oriented interests of the TNCs/MNCs. Crops are bought at unreasonably low prices and worse is that the growers alone suffer the losses brought about by calamities like El Nino, pest infestation and others. Mindanao, from where 40% of the country’s food products come from, have suffered from food and rice shortage in 2009.

Farmers – turned workers in crop processing plants suffer from wages that are below the minimum wage, and from government-dictated minimum wages that barely compensate their labor. Worse, contractualization, union busting, and other labor-related abuses continue to be rampant today.

Large-scale Mining affects the peasantry in Compostela Valley

The encroachment of large scale and foreign investments by foreign mining TNCs, in Mindanao have disenfranchised farmers and indigenous peoples from their rights to land, and their basic human rights as a whole . In Compostela Valley Province alone, which is known for its large deposits of gold, mining applications have gobbled up 214,715.14 hectares of land, while agricultural development covered only 119,600 hectares.

Compostela Valley is also host to the large-scale operations of Echo Bay, Toronto Ventures and Crew Minerals, to name a few, which are all Canadian-owned mining corporations. Meanwhile, mineral rich lands Diwalwal and Pantukan are targeted by large scale mining operations in order to address the increasing demands for minerals of 1st world countries. Amidst this, mining TNCs have continued to evade paying reparation to the people and communities affected by mining – related environmental destruction and tragedies such as those that happened in Kingking, Pantukan, Masara, New Leyte, Compostela Valley Province.

The deregulated and export-oriented mining operations in the country has also posed environmental and economic risks --- the impact of toxic pollution caused by lead, arsenic and mercury that come from the processing of gold and minerals and landslides in mining areas have been well documented problems caused by large scale mining.

Failure of CARP

Amidst this, the failure Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) which was extended for another 5 years under the Arroyo administration is ominous.

In the Davao Region for instance, where population of farmers would account for 60-70% of the total population, the DAR on the other hand has only distributed lands to as much as 140,000 agrarian reform beneficiaries.

70% of the “landed” farmers in Davao region till only about 2 hectares of land, whose yields are hardly able to sustain their basic needs for food. While generally, 7 out of 10 farmers do not own the land they till. 90% of the farmers in Lomundao, Marilog and Paquibato District in Davao City, for instance, who have been tilling the land for around 30 to 50 years have only been awarded stewardship rights and are now threatened to be displaced by mining, and massive land conversion due to a jathropa plantation and state-declared reservation area.

Militarization and Human Rights Abuses

The lack of social services such as access to primary and secondary education and access to medical health services in rural poor communities have worsened the situation of hunger and poverty experienced by the peasantry.

On top of these, we, farmers also suffer from the dehumanizing consequences of militarization patterned after the military counter insurgency plan Oplan Bantay Laya 2. In the 3rd Quarter of this year in Davao Region alone, two farmers from Paquibato District and one farmer from Mawab have been brutally slain.

Justice continues to evade the families of Farmers Association of Davao City (FADC) farmer leader Celso Pojas and of Ludinio Monzon, an anti-mining activist and a lumad farmer from Davao Oriental; both were slain by military agents in 2008 and 2009, respectively.

Hamletting of our communities where military reign with terror continues unabated despite the dangers that this military practice posed on the civilian populace. The military has indeed lost any sense of morality and respect of dignity as the rights women, men and youth are consistently violated.

Peasants continue to struggle for land and Justice

Under the PNoy Administration where the Filipino peoples had banked on for social and political change, we see no sense of hope, peace nor justice coming for the Filipino peasantry.

In the very own backyard of President Noynoy, the Cojuangco’s hacienda where 7 Hacienda Luisita farmers have been massacred in 2004 , justice is dead. So goes in the rest of the country. So goes for the whole nation.

With this, the Filipino peasants affirm its continued militant struggle for land and the right to till. We avow to renew our strength at each time that the threats to our life and democratic rights are also intensified by this puppet, unjust and anti-people government.

We enjoin all Filipino farmers, the Filipino workers, and our fellow Filipinos to stand by our side as we continue the struggle for genuine land reform, social justice in defense of our patrimony against the ever sharpening attacks of US imperialism through its vassals of power in the bureaucracy and feudal system. #

FOR REFERENCE:

Pedro Arnado
Chairperson
KMP-SMR

Negros farmers protest against Criminalization of Agrarian Cases, Extra-judicial Killings and Militarization

in front of DOJ, October 26, 2010 (Original Message) oct 27 doj abante3

Photos by UMA Pilipinas

Twisting the Justice System to Render Agrarian Reform Inutile

http://www.bulatlat.com/main/2010/10/30/twisting-the-justice-system-to-render-agrarian-reform-inutile/

Big landowners in Negros Occidental have found another way to retain and re-concentrate the land in their hands: file criminal cases against peasants and farm workers.

By JANESS ANN J. ELLAO

Bulatlat.com

MANILA — Early morning of November 15, 2009, 22 peasant families went to Lot No. 1156 of Hacienda Filomena in Escalante City, Negros Occidental to demand what was due to them. They cultivated the land because the landlord has not paid the monetary claims they have won in the case they filed before the National Labor Relations Commission. In return, however, the landlord filed several criminal cases against them.

Rebecca Bucabal, 56, one of the peasants who cultivated the five-hectare-Lot No. 1156, was aware of the possible criminal charges that might be filed against them. “But we do not have much choice,” she told Bulatlat in a mix of Tagalog and Visayan language, “We are hungry.”

Bucabal’s parents were already working in the 60-hectare Hacienda Filomena way before she was born. Bucabal later married Rufino, now 59 years old, who also works in Hacienda Filomena. Since the time of Bucabal’s parents until the present, farm workers in the hacienda endured the low salary being given to them, which was no more than P80 ($1.86) a day, depending on the type and amount of work being assigned to them.

In 1996, many farm workers were dismissed without prior notice by the Ocdenaria family, the landowners. Only 34 of them were brave enough to file a case against Ocdernarias before the National Labor Relations Commission for illegal dismissal and non-payment of their rightful salaries.

Two years later, the NLRC issued a decision favoring the farm workers. The Ocdenaria family was ordered to pay P1.5 million ($34,883) in back wages to the farm workers. But after more than a decade of waiting, “we have not received a single centavo,” Bucabal said. Worse, the 34 farm workers were still not given work at the hacienda.

Bucabal said this pushed them to occupy Lot No. 1156, “to recoup their (Ocdenarias) debt to us.” Only 22 of the 34 farm workers, who filed the NLRC case, and their families have returned to acquire and cultivate the land, calling their claim-making act as Balik Uma.

The struggle of the farm workers of Hacienda Luisita, a 6,453 real property co-owned by President Benigno S. Aquino, served as one of the inspirations of their Balik Uma. “Some of our farm workers would go there (in HLI) to work as seasonal workers,” Bucabal said, “So our Balik Uma is somehow patterned after their Bungkalan, only at a smaller scale.”

Filing of Criminal Cases

Bucabal and all her fellow farm workers are now facing criminal charges filed against them by the Ocdenarias.

She is facing six cases namely, Malicious Mischief, Usurpation of Real Right on Real Property, Grave Coercion, Other Forms of Trespass, Arson and Theft, though Bucabal admitted that the last two were the least that she expected.

A fire which burned the sugar cane planted at a parcel of land adjacent to Lot No. 1156 on March 17, 2010 around 2:00 p.m was made the basis of the arson case filed against Bucabal. On that day, she was sleeping in their camp-out, just outside Lot No. 1156 When she woke up. she related, “We called for firefighters and they managed to extinguish the fire,” she said.

However, as soon as the firefighters extinguished the fire, another end of the sugarcane plantation was, again, set on fire. “Even the firefighters were confused,” she said. She received a subpoena for the arson case in May.

The theft case, on the other hand, was filed after the farm workers attempted to sell the sugarcane they harvested on October 3, 2010. At around 4:00 p.m. that day, 10 farmworkers and their driver left Lot No. 1156 to sell the sugarcane, which Bucabal estimated at around 10 tons. Upon arriving in Escalante City, however, Ranil Pritos, a traffic enforcer, confiscated the sugarcane.

“Our driver was told that we were stealing g sugarcane from the hacienda,” Bucabal said. All 10 farmworkers and the driver were charged with theft.

“I am ready no matter what happens,” she firmly told Bulatlat, “I am not afraid.”

More Cases

Bucabal, however, is not alone. In a legal clinic organized by the Sentro Para sa Tunay nga Repormang Agraryo (SENTRA), a peasant rights’ legal assistance group, on September 12 in Escalante, Negros Occidental, they found out that the filing of criminal cases against peasants involved in agrarian disputes are common in the province. The peasants and farm workers from 20 haciendas in Negros revealed that the most common cases being filed against them are Forcible Entry, Grave Coercion, Malicious mischief, Usurpation of Real Rights on Real Property.

In Negros, there are 50 peasants and farm workers who have been charged with criminal cases because they have been at the forefront of the struggle for genuine agrarian reform. Jobert Pahilga, executive director of Sentra, said that this is “very alarming.”

Pahilga told Bulatlat that the increasing number of criminal charges being filed against peasants and farm workers are “reflections of the poor agrarian reform system (in the country).” He said the filing of criminal cases are soon followed closely by the filing of ejectment cases against the peasants and farm workers. This, said Pahilga, results in the re-concentration of land to a few big landowners.

The Genuine Agrarian Reform Bill, which was refiled in the present congress, could have strengthened agrarian reform in the country and could have corrected the loopholes of the current Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with Reforms (CARPER) However, it is still pending and has not progressed even an inch.

Calls for Investigation

On October 26, peasants group from Negros wrote a letter to Justice secretary Leila de Lima, appealing for an urgent investigation of the “criminalization and resurgence of the filing of trumped-up charges by big land lords and local government, military and police authorities against farmer leaders and members involved in agrarian disputes.

“Farmers and farm workers’ acts of cultivating the land has become ‘usurpation of private property,’ cleaning the field has become ‘arson,’ harvesting the fruits of their labor has become ‘qualified theft,’ holding meetings has become ‘illegal assembly,’ and asserting one’s rights as (Agrarian Reform Beneficiaries) has become ‘grave threats’ or ‘coercion,” their letter read.

The peasant groups said that aside from the fact that farmers and farm workers who do not have the resources to defend themselves are charged in court, “it also disrupts their otherwise normal lives as many of those who are facing criminal charges have been jailed or threatened with arrest. Thus, many are forced to hide and stop working or to post bail, adding to their financial burdens.”

Bucabal said, “I challenge Pres. Benigno Aquino III to look into the situation of farmers like us. We are fighting for the future of our children and grandchildren.” (Bulatlat.com)