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PARTY-LIST SOLONS ON THE SUMILAO FARMERS ISSUE |
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PARTY-LIST SOLONS ASSAIL DAR FOR INACTION ON SUMILAO FARMERS
Akbayan Representative Risa Hontiveros-Baraquel and Anak Mindanao Representative Mujiv Hataman today deplored the continuing inaction of the Department of Agrarian Reform to the petition filed by the farmers of Sumilao, Bukidon
Ten years ago this month, farmers from Sumilao in Bukidnon who belong to Mapadayonong Panaghiusa sa mga Lumad Alang sa Damlag (MAPALAD) staged a 28-day hunger strike in front of the office of the Department of Agrarian Reform in Quezon City calling for the redistribution of the 144 hectares of their ancestral land controlled by Norberto Quisumbing Sr Management and Development Corporation (NQSRMDC). Former President Ramos' offered a so-called Win-Win formula by giving 100 hectares to the farmers and the remaining 44 to NQSRDMC. It was later nullified by the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, the Quisumbings sold the land to San Miguel Food Inc., which put up a piggery farm. The Sumilao farmers said that this is a violation of the conversion order. In November 2004, the Sumilao farmers filed a petition for the cancellation of Conversion Order over the disputed land.
"The utter disregard of the department to the plight of the Sumilao lumad-farmers smacks of discrimination. Celebrating the Indigenous Peoples month is meaningless if a national government agency such as DAR pay no attention to the plight of the lumad," said Rep. Hataman.
For her part, Rep. Hontiveros-Baraquel said that DAR's lack of action on the case of the farmers of Sumilao demonstrates the inherent weakness of the 19-year old Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program. "It is not only the lack of budget that bedevils CARP but also its vague provisions which allows land owners and big agro-industrial corporations to circumvent the law," said the solon who has filed House Bill 1257, the CARP Extension and Reform Bill which seeks to plug loopholes in the existing law and accelerate the implementation of the program.
In their position paper, the Sumilao farmers said that their petition does not assail the previous Supreme Court decision approving the Conversion Order then Executive Secretary Rube Torres. They said that conditions of the Conversion Order were "willfully breached by the NQSRDMC manifesting its incapability to implement the authorize land use plan."
The activist solons agreed that the current status of the CARP mirrors the plight of the Sumilao farmers. "As we enter the 20th year of the implementation of CARP, 70% of the 10.2 million marginal farmers, tenants and farmworkers are still without land. It is lamentable that the landowning elite and large corporation seems to have found a willing accomplice in the government in the continuing violation of the program." they said.
Meanwhile, starting today fifty farmers will march on foot from Sumilao, Bukidnon to the DAR office in Quezon City to press the government to revoke the Conversion Order and install them as the rightful owner of their ancestral land. "The land is our life, it is what nourishes us as a people and as a community. Violence and intimidation will not deter us from fighting for what is ours," the Sumilao farmers said. |
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