Poor Filipino Farmers Knock On Palace Door

Cabinet Secretary Silvestre Bello assures farmers, who stage a hunger strike from President Gloria Arroyo’s husband Jose Mihuel Arroyo’s 157-hectare sugar land that the Palace will act on their issue. A meeting with Land Registration Authority administrator Benedicto Ulep, Department Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser Pangandaman, Task Force Mapalad chairman Christian Monsod, and the group’s president Jose Rodito Angeles is set next Monday, December 8, 2008. Bello appealed to farmers to lift their 5-day hunger strike as they negotiate. Farmers are calling for the distribution to farmers-beneficiaries under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program of Arroyo’s Hacienda Bacan in Negros province as promised by the President in 2001 when President Joseph Estrada was ousted.

MANILA, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Dec. 5, 2008) – Poor Philippine farmers who are now on their fifth day of hunger strike in front of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) in Quezon City have gathered in front of Malacañang on Friday to seek audience with President Gloria Arroyo and ask her to keep her promise to distribute Hacienda Bacan and other landholdings owned by the family of her husband Jose Miguel Arroyo in Negros Occidental province.

Jose Rodito Angeles, president of the peasant federation Task Force Mapalad, said they have decided to go to Malacañang after the government agencies which are supposed to look into their plight ignored their pleas.

“We have been asking the Register of Deeds (ROD) in Bacolod City for over a month now to register the CLOA (Certificate of Landownership Award) of farmer-beneficiaries in Hacienda Bacan. We have gone to the Land Registration Authority, only to be arrested by police. We have urged Mike Arroyo to obey the law and stop resisting the distribution of his hacienda. Our pleas have fallen on deaf ears,” said Angeles, a former farm worker of the Arroyos in Hacienda Grande in the village of Robles in La Castellana town.

“Now we go to the President herself. She made a promise not just once, but several times in the past, to distribute the Arroyo landholdings. We want her to keep that promise. We want her to tell her husband to stop pressuring the ROD to delay the registration of the CLOA for Hacienda Bacan,” Angeles said.

TFM had earlier called for the relief of lawyer Romulo Gonzaga, chief of the ROD in Bacolod City, for allegedly obstructing the process of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform (CARP) in the 157-hectare Hacienda Bacan, located in the village of Guintubhan in the town of Isabela.

The farmers also called on LRA Administrator Benedicto Ulep to process the registration of their CLOA in the wake of Gonzaga’s adamant refusal to register it. Angeles said they will also ask President Arroyo to ensure the distribution of another Arroyo hacienda—the 10-hectare portion of the 197-hectare Hacienda Grande.

He said the 10 hectares were the only piece of land left for CARP coverage after the hacienda was subdivided into 42 titles to evade distribution. (With a report from Lani Factor)

Hunger strike physically costly to farmers

Peasants continue protests in the Philippines.

MANILA, Philippines (AHRC / Dec. 5, 2008) - After three days of running and hunger strike, the effect had unfortunately been physically costly to some of the farmers.

One of the eight farmers on hunger strike, 22-year-old Aireen Celis, had to be taken to a nearby hospital, East Avenue Medical Center (EVMC), after she fell ill. Before she was taken to hospital she told her colleagues that she was feeling weak, dizzy and her head was aching while tightly holding her stomach.

What she had the past three days was only water and no food.

Aireen's colleagues and Fr. Robert Reyes, a staff member of the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), took her to the hospital for treatment. Later, she was diagnosed to have suffered from dehydration and her sugar count was low.

Aireen is the daugther of Jose Celis, one of the farmer beneficiaries of the land of President Arroyo's husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo, in Isabela, Negros Occidental. She was also one of those 30 farmers arrested and briefly detained at a police station in Kamuning, Quezon City on November 27, for holding a protest at the Land Registration Authority (LRA).

At the time, the group of farmers were demanding the LRA to intervene by taking action to the refusal of the Registry of Deeds (ROD) in Bacolod City to have ownership of the 157 hectares of land transferred from the Arroyo family to the Philippine government after the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) paid about P42 million (Approximately US$ 85,000) for the property on behalf of the farmers.

Aireen's brief detention and the suffering her sickly father had to endured, has left her no choice, according to her colleagues, that prompted her to take part in the indefinite hunger strike together with seven other farmers. Since her sickly father could not be physically present in Manila, she took this on in his stead. She is the youngest person and the only woman in the group.

Also, even though her colleagues were at first reluctant to let her join the hunger strike as she was having fever days after she and her colleagues were released from detention Aireen nevertheless decided to carry on.

Apart from the toll on Aireen's health, some of the farmers from Ugnayan ng Mga Nagsasariling Lokal na Organisasyon sa Kanayunan (UNORKA) and Task Force Mapalad (TFM), both people's organisation helping farmers to claim ownership of land under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP), who joined the run since December 1 had to reconsider joining on the fourth day.

Farmers from UNORKA, including the elderly, decided not to join; and some of whom began to suffer severe muscle pain, and their legs began to swell and became numb. While the farmers from TFM are themselves ready to resume the run on the fourth day they had to reconsider due to concerns that their health may deteriorate if not given a day rest.

Also, heavy downpours prevented the overly exhausted farmers from resuming the run.

Though the farmers has not been able to make it on the fourth day Reyes pledged to complete the run of 157-kilometres even the farmers would be not able to join him.

"Naiintindihan ko ang paghihirap ng magsasaka dahil sanay sila magbanat ng buto sa sakahan, at hindi tumakbo sa lansangan, ngunit nangako ako na tapusin ang 157 na kilometro kaya tatapusin ko; kung kinakailangan hanggang Hong Kong, (I understand what farmers had to endure because they are use to working hard at farms and not to run on streets. However, I have promised to complete the 157 kilometre even if it means completing it in Hong Kong)” Reyes said.

Reyes is also the programme officer of the AHRC's Religious Groups for Human Rights (RGHR) in Hong Kong.

Philippine Farmers Seek Intervention Vs. Landlords

Philippine farmers protest.

MANILA, Philippines (AHRC / Dec. 4, 2008) - On its third day of run, farmers from two of the country's influential landlords -- the Arroyos and the Yulos -- sought urgent intervention from members of the Senate and the Houses of Representatives to address their desperate plight.

Apart from the farmers in Hacienda Bacan in Isabela, Negros Occidental -- which is owned by President Arroyo's husband, Jose Miguel -- farmers from Hacienda Yulo in Laguna province, have also been deprived from owning the land they have been cultivating.

Of the 7,100 hectares of land in Hacienda Yulo, about 3,256 of it is being claimed by the farmers whose ancestors have been occupying and cultivating the land since 1905. It was first given to the Madrigal Family during the Spanish Colonization, however, it was later transferred to Jose Miguel Yulo, whose family is the present owner.

At least 1,354 farmer beneficiaries are seeking ownership to the land. Even before the law obligating the government to distribute lands to landless farmers, the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Programme (CARP), was made into law as early as 1960s, the ancestors of the present claimants and the claimants themselves, who were young then, have began their fight to own the land.

In 1990, three years after the CARP was made into law, the farmer beneficiaries applied for inclusion in the land for distribution under the CARP. However, surprisingly despite the farmers' pending applications three years later the land has been declared exempted from CARP, on the pretext that it is industrial and commercial land. Under the CARP, lands of this classification are exempted from distribution.

However, the process of the conversion of the land, which resulted in the lands exemption from distribution, has been highly questionable. At the time, the municipal mayor Jesus Miguel Yulo, the son of the owner and the zoning administrator -- who have had connections with the Yulos -- have deliberately abused their authority.

They have used their influence by converting the contested land to industrial, to ensure that it would be exempted from distribution.

It was learned though that since 1993 the land has been idle, neither used for industrial nor for commercial purposes. The municipal government of Calamba have likewise issued a certification which affirms that the contested land has been idle.

The said certification was submitted to the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) for them to reconsider the earlier decision exempting the land; however, the DAR nevertheless stood firm to its previous decision exempting the land for distribution.

In 2006, after learning the irregularities in the process of the exemption, the farmers filed a petition seeking to revoke the land's classification which remains pending. Also, Nasser Pangandaman, the DAR secretary, has also repeatedly denied the farmers' petition to revoke the earlier decision exempting the land from CARP citing its questionable conversion, on several occasions.

The DAR has stood firm on its earlier decision. In 2007, the Yulos instead offered to distribute home-lots to farmers, which measure about 150 square meters, to each beneficiary and cash worth PHP13,000 (USD263) supposedly as “disturbance compensation”; however, expectedly the farmers have refused their offer. One of the farmers said that what they needed is not home-lots, but land to farm and somewhere they could build their homes.

To date, the farmer's petition asking the DAR to reconsider its earlier decision is not showing any progress. This was the issue the farmers brought as they run from the head office of the DAR towards the House of Representatives.

Not only the farmers from Hacienda Yulo have sought for legislators' intervention, farmers from the Arroyo's have also sought the help from members of Senate.

After the 7-kilometre run from DAR to the House of Representatives was completed, a separate run, this time farmers from the Arroyo land, also took place which began from the Baclaran Church in Coastal Road, in Manila, towards the Senate building.

Shortly after the farmers arrived, led by Catholic priest Fr. Robert Reyes, a staff member of the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), at the Senate some of them also joined the Senate committee hearing on the Arroyo land. The Senate's committee on agrarian reform was conducting an inquiry, in aid of legislation, as to why the Arroyo farmer's land in Negros Occidental have not been able to acquire the land under the CARP.

After the committee hearing was concluded it still failed to come out with a concrete resolution to immediately address the Arroyo farmers' demand to ensure the speedy distribution of the contested land to them. About AHRC: The Asian Human Rights Commission is a regional non-governmental organisation monitoring and lobbying human rights issues in Asia. The Hong Kong-based group was founded in 1984.

Gunman Kills Farmer Who Fought For Peasants' Rights In The Philippines

NEGROS ORIENTAL, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Dec. 4, 2008) - A Filipino farmer was shot dead by an unidentified gunman while outside his house in the former property of former Negros Oriental Rep. Herminio Teves in the village of Villareal in Santa Catalina here.

Edna Sobrecaray, spokesperson of the peasant group called Task Force Mapalad said Arnaldo Hoyohoy, 40, was shot at around 6.30 p.m. on Wednesday. He left behind his wife and four children.

Hayohoy's father, Romualdo, is a CLOA (Certificate of Land Ownership Award) holder and his brother Alexander was among a group of farmers who joined the two-month camp out in front of the Department of Agrarian Reform in Quezon City to press for the distribution of the 61-hectare Teves property.

Hoyohoy also was among those who led the land entry on November 6 in the former Teves estate while other farmers who camped in front of DAR Central office held a two-week hunger strike.

Sobrecaray condemned the murder. She said that while they still have to establish the motive for the killing, “the death of Hoyohoy underscores the need for authorities to provide protection to farmer-beneficiaries.”

Hoyohoy’s wife Lorna said they were inside the house near the property’s gate, together with Hoyohoy’s father and brother Alexander when they heard a gunshot.

They said they rushed outside the house and saw Hoyohoy sprawled on the ground with a wound on his right cheek, and on inspection found an exit wound on the neck.

They immediately brought Hoyohoy to Bayawan City Hospital but due to lack of equipment, the hospital dispatched an ambulance to bring Hoyohoy to Dumaguete City.

Hoyohoy succumbed to his wound at around 8:30 p.m. while on the way to Dumaguete City.

Sen. Aquilino Pimentel, who was one of the personalities who helped the farmers acquire the Teves property, condemned the killing. “I fear that this might be connected to the recent installation of the farmers in the property, but I hope it’s not,” Pimentel said.

Witnesses, including Caranoche Councillor Dennis Sales and Carlos Magli told the Santa Catalina police that he saw the gunman wearing a green shirt pointed his weapon and fired at Hayohoy who was about to close their house’s gate. The unidentified gunman escaped with another companion, who acted as his lookout. The assailant also left his slippers.

Initial police report said the suspects fled toward the Negros Oriental State University where a student spotted them.

Hoyohoy’s father, who was granted CLOA by the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) in 1997, is among the 30 CLOA holders installed in the property by agrarian officials on November 12 after almost 11 years of legal battle with the landowners. (With a report from Lani Factor)

Solo protest seeks land reform extension in the Philippines

MANILA, Philippines - A Filipino priest, known in the Philippines as the "running priest", held a solo protest inside the Philippine Congress in Quezon City on December 2 calling upon legislators to consider as a priority, the extension of the land reform law.

Before he resumed his daily 15-kilometre run together with farmers, Fr. Robert Reyes, went inside the Congress' main lobby where he offers his daily prayer for the farmers and reaffirmed the latter's demand that a bill which seeks for the extension of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) with reform be passed promptly before the year end.

There are serious concern that once the year ends without passing a law extending it and by including reforms, the plight of landless farmers will hang in the balance; and that those who are supposed to be beneficiaries under the CARP, would have no other means or legal remedies at all to seek ownership of the lands they till.

Although the implementation of the law itself is inadequate and ineffective; however, either not having or losing the legal obligation on part of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), the implementing agency of the land distribution programme, to pursue land reform ownership would become even more extremely difficult.

Two decades after the land reform law took affect; thousands of hectares of land all over the country have failed to have been awarded to farmers.

In Negros Occidental alone, a local group called Task Force Mapalad (TFM), said the claims of a total of 11,239 hectares of land covering 134 haciendas by about 5,731 farmer beneficiaries remain pending at all levels of the CARP process. This includes the 157 hectares of land owned by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo, in Isabela.

The DAR's huge backlog in the distribution of lands under the Land Acquisition and Distribution (LAD) claims has also since been aggravated by the needless and the deliberate delays in the processing of farmer's applications, landlords either using their political influence upon the government agencies or threatening them with legal action; and political interference to subvert the supposed to be ordinary process of land distribution.

Before leaving the Congress lobby to resume his daily run, Reyes, also a staff member of the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), displayed his placard on which the demands for the CARP's extension is written.

Reyes also offered a short prayer on behalf of the farmers in front of a wall where the pictures and names of the members of the Philippine Congress are displayed.

On his way out, Reyes joined several other farmers who were waiting for him at the gate outside the Congress compound; and shortly after they resumed their run towards the head office of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR). It was Reyes' and the farmer's second run as part of their daily 15-kilometre run in ten days.

One of those joining Reyes and the farmers in their run was Reiko Sembad, a 22-year-old student of Cultural and Tourism Studies from a university in Tokyo. Reiko, like other farmers who joined the run, did not mind the scorching heat and exhaustion during the run.

The farmers, including the elderly, who joined the second day run were even wearing flip tops and trousers. However, despite not wearing running gear and not prepared, their endurance and willingness to complete the run was moving.

In the afternoon, Reyes held a mass inside the farmers' makeshift tents where they apparently been staying on protest for the past several weeks in front of the DAR. It is also the place where eight farmers from the Arroyo land are holding their indefinite hunger strike.(The Asian Human Rights Commission)

After 10 years, 30 Negros Farmers Finally Get Justice

The Task Force Mapalad farmer-beneficiaries and their families inside the 61-hectare farms in the village of Caranoche in Sta. Catalina town and the village of Villareal in Bayawan City. (AKP Images / Buck Pago)

BAYAWAN CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Nov. 12, 2008) – Philippine agrarian officials on Wednesday finally installed 30 farmers who are beneficiaries of the 61-hectare land in Negros Oriental province and this after almost a decade since they were issued their Certificates of Land Ownership Award (CLOA).

The farmers had been fighting for their rights to the lands they have tilled for many years now. The land in Bayawan City was formerly owned by the family of Herminio Teves, an ex-member of the House of Representatives.

The farmers earlier held a hunger protest and camped out of the property and office of the Department of Agrarian Reform with their families and supporters for more than two months over the government’s failure to install them as beneficiaries despite their land ownership certificates under the land reform program.

Rodolfo Inson, regional director of the Department of Agrarian Reform, escorted by policemen, has formally installed the farmers without any untoward incident.

Bayawan City Mayor Herman Saraña and Sta. Catalina Mayor Ruben Melodia together with the Teves lawyer witnessed the ceremony.

Rolando Flores, chairman of Villareal-Caranoche Agrarian Reform Farmers’ Association (VillaCARFA), said that the former solon after trying for 10 years to prevent distribution of the property finally relented and had also agreed to relinquish the standing crops to them.

“After all is said and done, everything ended just fine, at least for us. We can now leave the animosity and bitterness behind and move on,” Flores said.

The farmers’ organization called Task Force Mapalad, of which VillaCARFA is a member, said the victory of the farmer-beneficiaries proved that the only hope of the landless rural poor is through the process of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

“The farmer-beneficiaries of the former Teves property won because they fought with determination for the CARP process. Without CARP and the laws that guarantee their rights to own land, they could not have won the battle,” said Jose Rodito Angeles, the TFM president.

TFM farmers last week also trooped to the Philippine National Police headquarters in Manila and sought protection for their colleagues and families they were harassed by armed men.

Angeles said Congress should work diligently for the immediate passage of a law extending CARP beyond 2008. He said, however, that even if Congress fails to extend CARP, the peasant struggle for land will continue.

“We will find new grounds of engagement. The battle for land rights will not end with the demise of CARP,” he said. (With a report from Lani Factor)

Farmers Hold Picket In Central Philippines

BACOLOD CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Nov. 5, 2008) - Filipino Farmers demanding government action on several long-pending land cases have laid “siege” Tuesday on the provincial office here of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) and painted its gates with the notice: “Closed until further reforms.”

“We are declaring the office of the DAR closed until further reforms,” said Jose Rodito Angeles, president of Task Force Mapalad, during a symbolic “shutdown” ceremony outside the gates, which gave way to the onrush of protesting farmers, prompting the security guards to fire warning shots.

Angeles said that DAR had stopped processing the pending land cases after the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law (CARL) expired last June.

“DAR has become a warehouse of non-performing assets. No matter what we do, despite our repeated pleas and protests, and despite the fact that the CARP process can still continue until the end of this year, the DAR simply ignored our demand for installation of farmers who have been holders of Certificate of Land Ownership Award (CLOA) and for protection of farmer-beneficiaries (FB) who are being harassed, threatened and evicted by former hacienda owners,” Angeles said in a statement.

Among the pending land cases which the TFM farmers want DAR to immediately resolve are the generation and issuance of CLOA for FBs of Hacienda Bacan in the village of Guintubhan, Isabela; the installation and protection of FBs in Hacienda Canaan in the village of Mabini, Cadiz City; and protection of FBs in Hacienda Victoria in the village of Camangcang, Isabela, among others.

Angeles said that the 155-hectare Hacienda Bacan, owned by the family of First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo, had long been valued by the Land Bank of the Philippines but the bank, for unexplained reasons, had refused to issue a certificate of cash deposit in favor of the landowner.

TFM had earlier demanded that DAR already proceed with the generation and issuance of CLOA for FBs of the Arroyo-owned hacienda in view of Land Bank’s non-compliance with DAR’s repeated order for issuance of certificate of deposit.

In the case of the 533-hectare Hacienda Canaan and the 133-hectare Hacienda Victoria, the farmers are waiting for installation and are being subjected to harassment and intimidation from armed men who are either alleged members of the Revolutionary Proletarian Army (in the case of Hacienda Victoria) or the Philippine Army soldiers and hacienda security guards (in the case of Hacienda Canaan).

Last week, the farmers padlocked the DAR office in a show of protest, but TFM-Negros spokesperson Edna Sobrecaray said: “We are now sending the message that we will go on protesting, we will not stop protesting, CARP or no CARP, until our just demands are met.”

Sobrecaray added: “We know that DAR cannot and will not anymore pursue its CARP mandate. We cannot hope from this agency now because it has become hostage to the power politics of influential people in government. Malacañang and its allies are stalling and waiting for 2008 to end to finally kill CARP, but we will go on with the struggle for land even beyond 2008.”

In Manila, peasants were also protesting the government's failure to grant them the lands they till. Six of the farmers are in hunger strike, but one of them collapsed recently and rushed to hospital. (With a report from Lani Factor)

Farmers Harassed In The Philippines

BACOLOD CITY, Philippines - Peasant federation Task Force Mapalad has condemned the filing of "inciting to sedition" charges against five farmers from the Arroyo-owned Hacienda Bacan who were arrested Wednesday while trying to hold a protest rally in front of the Bacolod City Plaza as President Gloria Arroyo delivered her speech at the opening of the Maskarra Festival.

TFM president Jose Rodito Angeles said the police originally intended to file charges of public scandal against the farmers but they were informed by police chief Luisito Acebuche, Station 1 commander, that the Presidential Security Group insisted on the filing of sedition charges.

"We strongly condemn the filing of sedition charges. Reading the fine print of what had been done to us; this government has shown its blatant disregard for the rights of landless farmers to own and till their land. There is no basis in law to rationalize sedition raps against landless farmers calling for legitimate demands such as the implementation of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Programme," said Angeles.

He added: " We strongly urge the President to make good her public promise last May to distribute Hacienda Bacan, which is owned by the family of her husband," he said.

Angeles clarified that, contrary to reports, they were not part of the group that jeered and heckled President Arroyo during her speech at the opening of the Maskarra Festival.

"We were at the Bacolod Plaza and immediately dispersed and arrested after we put up our placards calling for the immediate distribution of the 157-hectare Hacienda Bacan owned by the family of the First Gentleman Mike Arroyo," said Angeles.

Angeles said they had not called for the ouster of President Arroyo contrary to media reports.

"It is high time that the President order the Agrarian Reform Department to continue CARP processes in the distribution of Hacienda Bacan by issuing Certificates of Land Ownership Awards (CLOAs) to qualified farmer beneficiaries. The Land Bank of the Philippines must now issue a cash deposit in the name of the landowner, the Rivulet Development
Corporation after a property valuation was finished more than two months ago," he said.

Angeles decried the continuing detention of the five farmers as a result of the filing of sedition raps. “The charges must be dropped immediately and our farmers must be released soonest,” Angeles stated.

They were identified as Hermigildo Padilla, Everlito Algona, Bonbon Algona, Noel Estaris Jr., and Gerry Batalla. A sixth farmer was earlier reported arrested but was able to slip away from his captors. (Lani Factor)

Peasants March In Southern Philippines, Disgruntled Over Arroyo's Rule

Peasants march in Philippines.

DAVAO CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / July 28, 2008) - Chanting their disappointment over what they call seven “unlucky” years of grave destitution of the Filipino farmers under the Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo presidency, peasants on Monday marched in Davao City in the southern Philippines to protest the current poverty situation in the country.

The protest coincided with President Gloria Arroyo’s 8th State of the Nation Address. Farmers together with Lumad tribesmen from Davao City’s said they are disgruntled and angry with the way the country, especially the agricultural sector, has been under Arroyo’s rule.

“President Arroyo should think twice before letting out promises that are already nailed even before she even finishes her SONA. Since 2001, she has promised cheap rice, prosperous farmers, and rice self-sufficiency. Now we dare her to look at the landless farmers eating root crops, bananas or nothing at all.”

“Look at the paupers in the street as they are made to beg for two kilos of rice which has tripled in cost,” said Tony Salubre, acting spokesperson of the Farmers Association of Davao City (FADC-KMP). Salubre cited landlessness as the prevailing problem of 70 % of the farmers in the region, a big percentage of whom are joining the increasing number of farm workers in banana or other crop plantations who he claim suffer from extremely low and unjust wages.

The protesters gathered at the Freedom Park where actors staged a play which showed hooded men in the act of beheading a farmer with a sickle, labeled with words “E-VAT (expanded value added tax) and RICE CRISIS.” Farmers complained that they are hardly able to get through a day with food on their stomach because of the high cost of basic commodities. Pedro Arnado, vice-chairperson of KMP- SMR, said more than 4,000 protesters also held a similar protest in North Cotabato province.

“Under GMA, this country has gone through the worst economic and political tragedy that this nation has never experienced before. The immorality, corruption, militarism and puppetry that have become the central policy of this regime, has made us the sick man of Asia that we are today,” Arnado said.

Arnado said the Arroyo presidency has been the worst “executioner” of farmers and Lumad who, due to extreme hardship is motivated to struggle and resistance.

Militant group KAWAGIB said Arroyo’s so-called pro-poor programs such as ‘Ramdam ang Kaunlaran’ and ‘Katas ng VAT’ as well as the mushrooming of foreign capitalists in the country, will again be the frontage of her rhetoric in the pretext of helping the Bangsamoro and Filipino people.

“But the truth continues to hunt the poor people. In a survey of Social Weather Station, 50% of the 88.9 million Filipinos are ‘self-rated poor’ and 14.9 million experiences hunger everyday while prices of oil and basic commodities continue to skyrocket. Cases of human rights violations are also continuing while the Bangsamoro people’s right to self-determination is not recognized,” it said.

Negros Farmers March In Manila

MAKATI, Philippines - Farmers from Negros Occidental, backed by peasant federation Task Force Mapalad, picketed the office of the Land Bank of the Philippines in Makati City to press for immediate valuation of the 157-hectare Hacienda Bacan owned by the family of President Gloria Arroyo's husband.

“It has been one month and a half now since DAR and Land Bank conducted a survey of Hacienda Bacan, and we were promised that valuation of the property would immediately follow after the survey. Nothing has happened yet,” said TFM spokesperson Edna Sobrecaray.

Issuance of property valuation by the Land Bank is the last step prior to issuance by the Department of Agrarian Reform of the certificates of landownership award (CLOAs) to farmer-beneficiaries.

Sobrecaray denounced Rivulet Agro-Industrial Corporation, the declared owner of Hacienda Bacan, for reneging at the last minute on its voluntary sale of the property to the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program and for sending its lawyer to intervene against the valuation.
Rivulet Corporation, owned by the family of Mike Arroyo, is managed by his brother Rep. Ignacio Arroyo.

“We were surprised to learn that Rivulet’s lawyer, Mr. Ruy Alberto Rondain, had written the Land Bank last June 2 asking it to suspend the valuation process purportedly because they have an application for land conversion pending before DAR,” said Sobrecaray.

Sobrecaray also denounced Land Bank for delaying the valuation. “It was supposed to have come out with the valuation in early May, after the survey of the hacienda at the end of April. There had been an agreement to fast track the valuation process because the farmers were anxious that CARP might end without the land being distributed,” she said.

President Arroyo had earlier ordered the distribution of Hacienda Bacan, located in the village of Guintubhan, Isabela, following a call by the Catholic bishops for distribution of Arroyo lands.
Her brother-in-law, Ignacio Arroyo had also said the plan to convert the property had been scrapped and that the hacienda could still be covered under CARP.

Sobrecaray said the case of Hacienda Bacan clearly shows that the Arroyo’s continue to evade CARP and to pursue conversion of the property for ethanol production.

“From what we can see, the Arroyos never meant to let go of the hacienda, but they were forced by public pressure and opinion to issue promises to distribute it. Behind the scene, they used their influence to delay the valuation, so that when CARP expires, as it did last Tuesday, they will have reason to proceed with conversion. The Arroyos are sly foxes. They keep on fooling everybody,” she said.

Sobrecaray said that if President Arroyo is serious about her call for a moratorium on land conversion, and if she was sincere about her order for distribution of Hacienda Bacan, she should ask her family to let go of the hacienda.

She added, however, that the farmers will not rely on the words and promises of the President.
“They will rely on their own determined efforts to fight for their right to land. With help from civil society and other sectors, they can hopefully win this fight,” she said. (Lani Factor)

Filipino Farmers Hold Anti-Government Protest In South

DAVAO CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Oct. 19, 2007) – Hundreds of farmers on Friday held a rally in Davao City in southern Philippines to protest the government’s failure to help alleviate the worsening poverty condition in the countryside.

Celso Pojas, regional spokesperson for the militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas, said farmers were also protesting the proposed extension of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

About 900 people joined the protest, which coincided with the commemoration of the Peasant month, he said.

The government’s agrarian reform program may be extended after President Gloria Arroyo certified as urgent a bill seeking a 10-year extension of the CARP, which is set to end in June 2008, ten years after it was passed.

The CARP is primarily a social reform measure and addresses the need for a more equitable distribution of land ownership. Its end-goal is to improve the standards of living of beneficiaries and promote greater economic activity in the rural areas.

But Pojas said extending the CARP would only exacerbate the plight of the farmers who, until now, suffers from landlessness and usurpation from big landlords and multi-national companies.

“We never benefited from the CARP. Our farmers remain landless,” Pojas told the Mindanao Examiner newspaper.

“The big landlords and multi-national corporations are the ones who have benefited from the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program, not us farmers. The CARP's distorted definition of agrarian reform and the law's actual provisions reveal its unmistakable bias in favor of landowners and agribusiness. This program has never been a solution to our problem.”

“Most of the benefactors do not have the security of owning the lands they tilt due to the imposition of heavy amortization of Land Bank. While some of us were forced to enter ‘growership’ contracts and leasehold arrangements with big plantations due to the lack of support from the government,” he said.

Pojas said the poor implementation of the CARP is worsened by feudal exploitation as many landlords continue to wield power in the countryside. “We call for the scrapping of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program not for its extension,” he said.

In Zamboanga City, Filipino agrarian expert Julita Ragandang the CARP extension would benefit more farmers. “There are still many things to do,” Ragandang, who heads the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) in Western Mindanao, said.

Some seven million hectares of agricultural lands, from more than four millions all over the country, have already been distributed. More than four million farmers benefited from the CARP, according to DAR, which is the lead implementing agency of the agrarian reform program.

It undertakes land tenure improvement, development of program beneficiaries, and the delivery of agrarian justice. DAR conducts land survey in resettlement areas. It undertakes land acquisition and distribution and land management studies. The DAR also orchestrates the delivery of support services to farmer-beneficiaries and promotes the development of viable agrarian reform communities.

The passage of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law (CARL), Republic Act 6655, in 1988 was hailed as a historic occasion. CARL promised to redistribute agricultural lands -- in several phases -- to those who actually till them.

Most of the government funding for CARP came from the recovered P50-billion of the so-called Marcos' ill-gotten wealth; however, only P10 billion was allocated to the DAR, the rest of the money was distributed to other agencies, including P8-million for human rights victims under then President Ferdinand Marcos.

Belgium, Spain and Japan among the countries that are supporting the CARP. (Mindanao Examiner)

Human Rights, Peasant Groups Accuse Philippine Soldiers As Behind Killing Of Old Man

COMPOSTELA VALLEY (Mindanao Examiner / 10 Jul) – Militant groups accused the Philippine military as behind the killing of a septuagenarian accused by soldiers as a member of the Maoist New People’s Army in Mindanao.

The human rights group, Karapatan, said two suspected soldiers barged in the house of peasant leader Alfonso Capiales, 72, in Nabunturan town’s Magsaysay village in Compostela Valley province and shot him several times.

Before he was killed, the military summoned Capiales, chairman of the Magsaysay Farmers Association and treasurer of the Nagkahiusang Maguuma sa Nabunturan, after accusing him as a rebel. The two groups also condemned the attack.

Capiales was also the provincial coordinator of the militant group Anakpawis, previously tagged by the military as an NPA front.

Karapatan has condemned the weekend killing.

“We hold the Arroyo government and the Armed Forces of the Philippines responsible for the killing of Capiales,” Kelly Delgado, the group’s spokesperson, said in a statement sent to the Mindanao Examiner.

A U.S.-based human rights group recently accused the Philippine military of engaging in a “dirty war” in a campaign to silent political activists in the country.

In an 84-page report released late last month, the Human Rights Watch said Manila should aggressively prosecute members of the security forces responsible for hundreds of extrajudicial executions in recent years.

Filipino militant groups said more than 800 people had been kidnapped and murdered since President Gloria Arroyo rose to power in 2001. Most of the killings, they said, pointed to the military as the culprit.

The extra-judicial killings in the Philippines continue unabated despite the investigations of the United Nations and the independent Melo Commission. Both investigations point to soldiers as allegedly responsible to most of the murders, an accusation strongly denied by the Philippine military.

The United States Senate is also investigating the extra-judicial killings in the Philippines. Summary executions are also rampant in the southern cities of Zamboanga, Davao, Digos and Cebu in the central Philippines. (With a report from Juan Magtanggol)