Lusita farmers slams DAR paid ad calling for second interview
NEWS RELEASE
August 6, 2011
Lusita farmers slams DAR paid ad calling for second interview
On the eve of the 3rd year of what it described as the ‘sham’ Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with Reforms (Carper) today, the militant peasant group Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas(KMP) and United Luisita Workers’ Union (ULWU) braved the rains and staged a protest camp-out at the Department of Agrarian Reform in Quezon City and blasted the agency’s paid advertisement that appeared in a major daily today calling on farm workers of Hacienda Luisita to attend its “second interview.” 
The DAR’s paid ad calls on farm workers of Hacienda Luisita, the more than 6,000 hectares sugar estate owned by the Cojuangco-Aquinos, to attend the second interview by the department on August 13 to 17 from 9:00 am to 4:00pm inside the covered courts in the villages of Hacienda Luisita. Those who will fail to attend will be interviewed on August 20-24 at the DAR Provincial Office.
“Instead of immediately moving for the cancellation of the Cojuangco family’s land title, the DAR appears to be very pre-occupied with this PR stunt involving the highly questionable and pro-Cojuangco enlistment scheme inHacienda Luisita,” says KMP deputy secretary general Willy Marbella.
Marbella said the verification scheme by the DAR is a waste of time and taxpayers’ money maintaining that 6,296 farm worker beneficiaries were already identified in 1989, the year when the DAR and the Cojuangcos placed the more than 6,000-hectare land under the controversial stock distribution option (SDO) scheme.
The KMP also insists that the so-called verification process by the DAR in Hacienda Luisita is a ploy by the Cojuangcos to evade land distribution.
“Our doubts that this so-called verification process is a brazen maneuver by the Cojuangcos were reinforced by the fact that this scheme was being extended despite the existence of original list of beneficiaries, has even surpassed the original number of beneficiaries, and is now turned into an obvious PR gimmick by the DAR,” says Lito Bais, United Luisita Workers’ Union (ULWU) chairperson.
“Obviously, President Aquino has direct knowledge and tolerates these moves by the DAR in Hacienda Luisita,” Bais said adding: “This scheme by the DAR serves the Cojuangcos agenda to bloat the number of beneficiaries, further reduce the size of land for distribution, sow confusion and disunity in our ranks, and eventually put their dummies and loyalists as so-called beneficiaries.”
Reports said that the DAR already interviewed 8,400 farmworkers allegedly to validate those who signed the November 1989 stock distribution option. The KMP said that “in just two barangays (villages), the DAR already interviewed 6,000 beneficiaries” referring to Barangays Cutcut and Balete.
Marbella also pointed out that “the non-cancellation ofHacienda Luisita land titles in 1989 when the lands were placed under SDO scheme of the CARP is one of the many reasons why the President’s family managed to illegally convert and sold hundreds of hectares to Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC).”
He added that “the non-cancellation of land titles also happened in the haciendas of Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco Jr., President Aquino’s uncle, in Bago and La Carlota cities in Negros Occidental, where Registry of Deeds records shows that Cojuangco titles included in the voluntary land transfer scheme and covered by certificates of land ownership award (CLOAs)were not cancelled.
“The Cojuangco-Aquinos land title over Hacienda Luisita is a symbol of ownership and feudal control, and should be junked,” Marbella said.
Aside from KMP and ULWU, hundreds of farmers from Hacienda Looc in Batangas led by the Katipunan ng mga Samahang Magbubukid sa Timog Katagalugan (Kasama-TK) and farmers from the Fort Magsaysay Military Reservation in Nueva Ecija led by the Alyansa ng mga Magbubukid sa Gitnang Luzon (AMGL) joined the camp out in front of the DAR. They are set to march to Mendiola Bridge tomorrow to demand the junking of the Carper and press for the enactment of House Bill 374 or the Genuine Agrarian Reform Bill that seeks the free distribution of lands to the tillers. #
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KMP National Secretariat
25-B Matiyaga Street, Barangay Central, Quezon City
Philippines
Telefax: 632-4352383
Email: kmp@kilusangmagbubukid.org
Web: www.kilusangmagbubukid.org
