“Grave insult,” KMP says on claim that Luisita distribution as ‘Cory’s glowing legacy’
NEWS RELEASE
April 27, 2012
“Grave insult,” KMP says on claim that Luisita distribution as ‘Cory’s glowing legacy’
The militant peasant group Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) today described as a “grave insult” to the farm workers’ struggle the Cojuangco family’s claim that Hacienda Luisita’s distribution should be a “glowing legacy” for the late President Corazon Cojuangco-Aquino.
The KMP issued the statement after Hacienda Luisita Inc. (HLI) counsel Antonio Ligon said that
“(This) should be a glowing legacy for the late former President Corazon Cojuangco Aquino.”
“It cannot be argued that Mrs. Aquino made decisive moves to place Hacienda Luisita in the 1980s under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) although the preference of farmer-beneficiaries for stock distribution option (SDO) prevailed in at least three referendums over land distribution,” Ligon said.
The KMP said the statement shows that “only two days after the SC ruling, the Cojuangco-Aquinos are already maneuvering to distort the historical facts.”
“The Cojuangcos continue to be masters of deception. Claiming the distribution of Hacienda Luisita as a glowing legacy of Cory is a grave insult to the struggle of the farmers and farm workers,” says KMP deputy secretary general Randall Echanis.
“This is a desperate ploy to fool Luisita farmworkers that they should be indebted forever to Cory and the Cojuangco-Aquinos for the distribution of the Hacienda,” Echanis added.
“In fact,” Echanis said, “CARP’s enactment into law during Cory‘s administration was exactly the scheme used by the Cojuangco-Aquinos to evade land distribution and strengthen their stranglehold over Hacienda Luisita.”
“The farmworkers don’t owe the Cojuangco-Aquinos anything. Their victory is a product of their determined struggle,” he said.
“CARPER is only the extension of the bogus CARP. It is the very same law that subjected the farm workers to feudal slavery,” says Echanis. 
He said that “under CARPER, landlords were given the right to identify who will be the beneficiaries. The Cojuangco-Aquinos will surely use this anti-peasant law to once again evade land distribution.”
“In the case of Hacienda Luisita, the Supreme Court said that there are more than 6,000 farm worker beneficiaries. We expect the Cojuangco-Aquinos to sow disunity, divide the ranks of farmworkers, and place their dummies,” Echanis said.
“The landlord president is set to mobilize all government agencies, including the military, and deploy special agents disguised as farmers’ groups to thwart the distribution of his family’s vast landholdings,” says Echanis noting that DAR officials yesterday said that “Hacienda Luisita is a massive project” and that they “would ask help from other agencies.”
The KMP leader said “these maneuvers must be countered by the farmers and farm workers’ continuing strong determination and assertion of their rights to the lands.”
“Hacienda Luisita farmers should not let their guards down. The Cojuangco-Aquinos are notorious of employing guns, goons, and gold inside the Hacienda,” Echanis said. #
–
KMP National Secretariat
25-B Matiyaga Street, Barangay Central, Quezon City
Philippines
Telefax: 632-4352383
Email: kmp@kilusangmagbubukid.org
Web: www.kilusangmagbubukid.org
