Protesters to defy rally ban

MANILA, Philippines - Even without rally permits, workers will hold mass protest actions against President Aquino today as he delivers his State of the Nation Address (SONA).

In Metro Manila, workers are defying the Quezon City government’s rally ban.

“We will not listen to the President’s SONA on Monday,” said Elmer Labog, Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) chairman. “We will instead assert that the real state of the nation be heard through our protests, with or without permits.”

Labog said Aquino would most likely tell “old lies” about improvements in the economy and give “empty promises” that economic growth would continue in the coming years.

“We are tired of hearing about so-called improvements in the economy when unemployment is increasing, wages are down, prices are soaring, and social services are decaying and getting scarce,” Labog said.

“This so-called growth is felt not by the needy poor but by the greedy rich.”

Labog said workers are also tired of Aquino’s tactic of blaming everything on the previous administration while claiming responsibility for so-called positive changes in the country.

 The government appears to be planning to unleash violence against protestors in deploying 6,000 policemen, 500 soldiers and 31 fire trucks in Metro Manila, he added.

The anti-SONA protest is the start of bigger and bolder mass actions against the Aquino administration’s anti-worker and anti-poor policies in the coming months, Labog said.

Farmer workers from Hacienda Luisita will join today’s protest march to the Batasang Pambansa to expose the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) and the Cojuangco family’s design to deceive them on land reform.

The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) deplored Agrarian Reform Secretary Virgilio delos Reyes for justifying the raffle system to distribute farm lots to beneficiaries of land reform in the Cojuangco-controlled estate

Delos Reyes said the “tambiolo” system was the fairest and most transparent method.

KMP secretary-general Antonio Flores said it was a scheme to divide the farm workers in the hacienda, as many of them would be displaced from lots they have already made productive.

“Delos Reyes is the hatchet man in the Cojuangco-Aquino’s grand design to deceive Hacienda Luisita farmworkers,” he said.

Flores said collective ownership of Hacienda Luisita would prevent re-concentration of lands into the hands of the Cojuangco-Aquinos.

“Unfortunately, the DAR disregarded this demand from the farmworkers and left them with only the tambiolo system,” he said.

Flores said the justification that the farmworkers are not tenants is the very same line that the Cojuangcos used in evading the conditionality of the Central Bank-guaranteed loan in 1957 that Hacienda Luisita, after 10 years, would be distributed to farmers under President Ramon Magsaysay’s social justice program.

“Second, the semi-feudal setup of having no fixed land to till, the backward and disorganized production exemplified by assignments and varying tasks in a landlord-controlled plantation, are exactly the problems that should be addressed by a genuine and free distribution of lands to the farmworkers. These real problems arising from landlord control of production cannot be addressed by Delos Reyes’ tambiolo land reform,” he said.

In Central Luzon, major farmers’ groups will hold a protest rally in Plaza Miranda in Angeles City today to demand fundamental reforms for farmers.

They released yesterday the state of Central Luzon report showing the region as rife with landlessness, poverty and hunger.

In a joint statement, the Alyansa ng mga Magbubukid sa Gitnang Luson, Anakpawis - Gitnang Luson and Alyansa ng Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Luisita, said: “Central Luzon has worsened under three years of Aquino governance.”

The farmers cited data showing that arising from land use conversions (LUCS), Central Luzon’s rice lands “aggregate shrinkage from 2010 to 2012 is at 6,120 hectares, with Tarlac province losing the biggest at 10,169 hectares.”

They warned that LUC threatens the region’s rice production that would definitely affect Metro Manila.

The statement said Aquino’s programs and policies have not uplifted the socio-economic wellbeing of farmers in Central Luzon.

“Aquino failed to address landlessness, which is the fundamental problem of farmers,” read the statement.

“By keeping poor farmers landless, they are shackled in deep poverty and hunger.”

The statement said the Aquino administration’s Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with reforms has kept farmers landless, while those awarded lands are being displaced.

“In Hacienda Luisita, farm workers who are cultivating lands since 2005 are now threatened to be displaced as Department of Agrarian Reform pushes through its lottery method of allocating lands,” read the statement.

The statement said farmers in Aurora province are being displaced to give way to the Aurora Pacific Economic Zone and Freeport project in Casiguran town.

-Mayen Jaymalin, Ding Cervantes