Philippine activists hold a rally for the release of farmers and agrarian reform advocates arrested last June 9 for asserting their right to land. (Courtesy of Mayday Multimedia)

The Coalition of Agricultural Workers International (CAWI) welcomes the release of 83 farmers and land reform activists in the Philippines last June 12, after three days of detention based on clearly trumped-up charges.

On June 9, local police violently dispersed and arrested 91 people, including members of MAKISAMA-Tinang, a peasant group, and their supporters for participating in a bungkalan (collective farming) activity to assert their right to land in the town of Concepcion, Tarlac province. Out of those arrested, the police filed cases of illegal assembly and malicious mischief against 83 people based on complaints of a cooperative controlled by a powerful politician disputing the farmers’ land claims. The farmers and their supporters were released after posting bail of ₱12,000 each (about $226) or a total of almost a million pesos (nearly $19,000).

“While the temporary liberty of the arrested farmers and land reform advocates is certainly welcome, it does not correct the grave injustices committed against them,” CAWI Secretary-General P.P. Sivapragasam said. “The farmers were oppressed twice over – first, when they were deprived for decades of tilling the land that rightfully belongs to them, and second, when powerful interests used their influence to harass and detain the farmers when they asserted their right to land. The fight for land and justice continues,” added Sivapragasam.

According to CAWI member Philippine Federation of Agricultural Workers (Unyon ng Manggagawang Agrikultura or UMA), the farmers of Tinang have been recognized as agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) under the government’s Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) since 1995.

For nearly three decades, over 236 peasant beneficiaries were promised a 200-hectare lot with a collective Certificate of Land Ownership Award (CLOA) under the program to legalize their right to the land they were arrested for this month – ironically, a day before the 34th anniversary of CARP.

MAKISAMA-Tinang has organized bungkalan activities for years to assert its members’ ownership of the disputed land. Such activities, which include the preparation of the land and the planting of food crops, are an expression of solidarity for the farmers and a form of resistance against the delayed awarding of the land amid a nearly 30-year wait.

The decades-long struggle for land in Tinang and the recent arrests of ARBs and their supporters illustrate the failure of land reform in the country. In addition to bureaucratic failure that delayed the awarding of the 200-hectare land promised to the farmers is the rise of state-sanctioned violence inflicted on farmers and land reform advocates.

“The rights of farmers, agricultural workers, and all food producers in the Philippines and elsewhere must be respected and advanced, especially amid a global food crisis, worsening hunger and poverty, and still ongoing pandemic,” Sivapragasam stressed. ###

Reference: P.P. Sivapragasam, Secretary-General (secretariat@agriworkers.org)