On the eve of the 34th year of the bogus Comprehensive Agrarian Reforn Program (CARP), tension escalated in a landholding in Concepcion Tarlac as some 20 police officers harassed the collective cultivation activity led by more than a hundred agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) belonging to the MAKISAMA-Tinang.
The ARBs and their families were starting land preparation activities so they can plant vegetables at Hacienda Tinang when the police arrived and disrupted the ongoing farm production. "Kami ay mga lehitimong benepisaryo ng lupa. Ang gusto lang namin ay mahawan ang tubuhan para makapagtanim ng mga gulay na makakain ng mga pamilya namin. Kung hindi kami magtatanim, mamamatay kaming dilat sa gutom dahil sa napakamahal na presyo ng bilihin," says Felino Cunanan, leader of MAKISAMA-Tinang.
Farmers, ARBs, and land reform advocates were starting to clear some two hectares out of the 200-hectares sugarcane plantation when the police arrived, forcing farmers out of the land. Concepcion Tarlac PNP and incoming Mayor Noel Villanueva also threatened to arrest and press charges the leaders of MAKISAMA-Tinang. A local DAR representative arrived at the area but left without resolving the tension. Villanueva, the outgoing Tarlac Representative is a member of the House Committee on Agrarian Reform. His family is embroiled in a land dispute with the ARBs.
Farmers and ARBs who have been tilling the land for the past 27 years are awaiting their official installation this month as promised by DAR Assistant Secretary John Lana.
The land preparation activities are part of the ARBs assertion of their right to the land. Each of the 236 ARBs who are all holders of Certificate of Land Ownership Awards (CLOAs) will get less than a hectare of land once DAR posts the official list of beneficiaries before June 30.
"Thirty-four years of CARP's failure led to the prolonged displacement of farmers and non-installation of agrarian reform beneficiaries on the land supposedly awarded to them under the bogus and pro-landlord CARP.
The 200-hectare sugarcane landholding is part of more than 1,200-hectares of land formerly owned by Benigno Aquino Sr. that was inherited by the Aquino siblings including Antonio Urquico Aquino who later sold the land to Dominican priests. In 1988, the said landholding was placed under voluntary land transfer (VLT) by the Dominican Priests of the Phils. Inc. under Cory Aquino's Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law (CARL). The farmer-tenants then applied to become beneficiaries. They were awarded their CLOAS in 1995.
Due to decades of non-installation, the farmers decided to collectively cultivate the land in 2016. The following year, they filed a petition for installation and in 2018 and 2019, DAR issued a writ of execution and ordered with finality the distribution and installation of the ARBs. However, the said order remains unrealized. DAR has been remiss on its duty and obligation to implement a comprehensive and genuine agrarian reform. More than three decades after CARP was enacted, nine out of ten farmers remain landless. ARBs on the other hand, still cannot pay the land amortization under CARP.
DAR failed to actualize equitable land distribution and land ownership, agricultural productivity, and tenurial security for land tillers. Rodrigo Duterte’s term will end with DAR neglecting the perennial call for free land distribution, according to Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas. ###
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