[asia-apec 1071] Landlordism centerpiece of Estrada's bogus land reform

[BAYAN]

KMP -- Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas
(Peasant Movement of the Philippines)
e-mail: <kmp at info.com.ph>; <magbubukid at hotmail.com>

NEWS RELEASE
9 April 1999

Landlordism, conversions now officially 
Erap's bogus land reform program centerpieces

After assuring export cropland monopolies last Christmas that they are safe
from the demands of peasants for land reform, the Estrada administration's
Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) unleashed Lenten torment when it
decreed all other farmlands to be fair game for conversion to
non-agricultural use. 

Thus noted KMP when it condemned the DAR for putting out Administrative
Order No. 1 series of 1999 during Holy Week, branding it another of the
agency's deceptive ploys to further dilute its token implementation of land
reform in favor of land monopolies. Early this year KMP condemned DAR's
midnight proclamation of Administrative Order No.9 Series of 1998 which
enshrined the corporative farming scheme of Marcos-Estrada crony Danding
Cojuangco and allowed big landlords like him to evade distributing
commercial farmland to tenants.

KMP chair Rafael Mariano said DAR hastily passed AO No. 1-1999 to legalize
the clandestine but highly profitable processing of applications for
conversions that piled up since Malacañang issued a half-hearted directive
suspending conversions in January. He pointed out that Section 6 blatantly
assigns Priority Development Areas for Conversion having been already
identified as such under legal instruments under the Marcos dictatorship
and subsequent administrations. These are the regional agro-industrial
centers, ecozones and tourism development areas named by the Medium Term
Philippne Development Plan. Local government units are also given wide
latitude in reclassifying even irrigated land into housing blocks.

The areas catalogued do not need environmental clearance certificates or
ECCs from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. This
provision alone threatens thousands of peasants across the nation of being
evicted from their farmlands, such as the 10,000 residents of the
8,600-hectare Hacienda Looc. Since 1995, they have been running legal
battles with the real estate giants Fil-Estate and Manila Southcoast
Development Corp. against plans to convert the lands, which have been
tagged as tourist development area despite being issued with agrarian
reform patents, into golf courses and beach fronts.

Guillermo Bautista, peasant leader of the Ugnayan ng mga Mamamayan Laban sa
Pangwawasak ng Kalupaan sa Hacienda Looc (UMALPASKA) says the removal of
the ECC requirement is another evidence of the Estrada government's
anti-peasant policies, and amounts to treachery on the part of DAR
Secretary Horacio Morales, who just last month promised to assist in
maintaining their legal stay on the rich sugar cane and rice farmlands.

Also at high risk is land eyed by House Speaker Manny Villar in San Jose
del Monte, Bulacan and the 44,000-hectare Clark Air Base, declared an
Ecozone by former President Fidel Ramos. 

"The deceptive order does not rationalize land conversions, rather
completely deregulates land-use policies according to the dictates of the
World Bank's willing buyers for willing sellers concept. This is a license
for a reconcentration of land monopolies by big landlords and multinational
firms," Mariano said.

He added that DAR AO No. 1-1999 will further unmask the vaunted food
security posture of President Estrada as a sham and heighten the resolve of
the peasantry to fight for genuine land reform. # # #