“Junk CARP!” farmer-solon insists

NEWS RELEASE
December 11, 2008

“Junk CARP!” farmer-solon insists
CBCP asked to resist evils of CARP

A militant peasant leader cum lawmaker today has drawn the lines against groups calling for the extension of a “pro-landlord and anti-peasant Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program.”

Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas chairperson and Anakpawis party-list Representative Rafael Mariano today reiterated calls on Congress to “junk the government’s pro-landlord Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program.”

“The Filipino peasantry’s 20-year experience under the sham CARP only led to the further strengthening of landlord, local and foreign agribusiness corporations’ monopoly and control of vast tracts of agricultural lands in the country,” says Mariano.

Mariano said that “the CARP provided non-land transfer schemes, like the Stock Distribution Option (SDO) scheme in Hacienda Luisita, Tarlac, Corporative Scheme in the Cojuangco lands in Negros Occidental, Leasehold Operations and other schemes of corporate venture arrangements, which exempted vast tracts of landholdings of big landlords and agro-corporations from actual and physical distribution to farmer-beneficiarie s. In addition, the establishment of Agrarian Reform Communities (ARCs) laid the ground for corporate intervention and control of agribusinesses over vast tracts of lands.”

The Anakpawis lawmaker said that “for more than two decades of the CARP’s implementation, land-grabbing intensified in the form of land-use conversions. Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) records showed that from 1979 to December 31, 2003, there were 2,885 approved applications for conversion involving 40,485.9124 hectares of agricultural lands, while the National Statistics Office (NSO), in 2002, cited that 827,892 hectares of agricultural land have been converted to other uses.”

Mariano stressed that “to protect, preserve and maintain ownership and control over the land, big landlords have resorted to the filing of cancellation of Certificates of Land Transfer (CLTs), Certificates of Land Ownership Award (CLOAs), and Emancipation Patents (EPs) distributed to farmer-beneficiarie s under CARP.”

“According to IBON Foundation, more than 2,000 EPs and CLOAs, covering 380,000 hectares of land, were cancelled by the middle of 2004,” peasant leader stressed.

“The most controversial land-grabbing cases and threats of farmers displacement in the country,” says Mariano includes “the 8,650 hectares of land in Hacienda Looc, Nasugbu, Batangas, the more than 28,000 hectares of land in Hacienda San Antonio and Santa Isabel in the province of Isabela, 35,000 hectares of lands in South Cotabato remains under the control of Dole Philippines, the whole island of Mindanao has become the heart of contract growing and leaseback arrangements depriving millions of farmers of their right to own the lands.”

Mariano also challenged the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines not to allow themselves to be used in the continuing deceptions and machinations by landlords and other groups in calling for the extension of the bogus and anti-peasant CARP.

“We call on the CBCP to resist the evils of CARP and instead support the peasant majority who did not benefit from the bogus CARP. It is not ‘CARP or nothing’ for the Filipino peasantry and we are not left without any option. We are more than willing to intensify our struggle in the countryside to own the land we till,” the peasant lawmaker said.

Mariano also chided the so-called reforms being introduced to the CARP as “mere icings on a rotten cake.’

“No amount of cosmetics can make the CARP appear to be pro-farmer. Extending CARP will not end the farmers’ struggle and their continuing long marches from their farms to the cities,” the militant solon said.

He called on fellow lawmakers to “enact a new and truly distributive land reform program embodied in House Bill 3059 filed by the progressive party-list bloc in the House.” #