[asia-apec 1384] Philippines: Peasants Call for Estrada's Ouster

[KMP]

KMP (Peasant Movement of the Philippines)

NEWS RELEASE
23 January 2000

Mendiola marchers demand Estrada ouster

MILITANT peasant and fishworker groups marched behind victims of human
rights violations on the 13th anniversary of the Mendiola massacre.
Together they called for the ouster of President Joseph Estrada. It was the
first major anti-government protest action in the Philippines for the year
2000.
 
Leading the march on Malacañang is the Kilusang Enero 22, a group of widows
and orphans of the thirteen peasants massacred on January 22, 1987 by the
marines and police who blocked and later fired at a big peasant march of
11,000 people demanding genuine land reform.

“The Filipino people now tell Estrada to leave the country with his
militarist clique Philippine National Police (PNP) Chief Panfilo Lacson and
Department of Interiors and Local Government (DILG) Secretary Alfredo Lim,
and together with the Marcoses and crony Danding Cojuangco. Erap should
bring along his drinking buddies and those among  his friends, relatives
and mistresses who like leaches are sucking our economy and government
coffers dry the way the Marcos cronies did!” said Rafael Mariano, chair of
the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP), the peasant alliance that
started the campaign thirteen years ago.

Mariano said the appointment of Lim to the DILG not only is an exoneration
of his role in the brutal carnage of peasants under the US-Aquino regime
but is proof of the rapid restoration of open fascist repression and
intensified militarization under Oplan Makabayan.

“Estrada is a consistent anti-poor and anti-democratic puppet of US
imperialism and landlord interests, shown by the worsening landlessness and
landgrabbing, as he surrendered the economy and the country's patrimony to
foreign monopoly capital and their local partners. And on top of that is
his racketeering in financial scandals of his gambling cronies.

“Impeachment is not enough for him. A tyrant like him must be taught a
lesson like the infamous dictator Marcos. He deserves to be humiliated and
sent running by an angry people. Stanley Ho’s floating casino Jumbo Palace
is big enough to take all of them away,” Mariano said.

He is reacting to calls made by the parliamentary opposition and business
sectors for Estrada's removal in the wake of the scandal surrounding his
involvement in the insider trading scam perpetrated by crony Dante Tan and
Macau gambling lord Ho.

The KMP statement junked a promise made by Estrada early in his term that
justice will be given to the Mendiola martyrs. His fake land reform
projects and the manipulation of the coconut levy talks that favor Cojuanco
and other big landlords are proof that he will never work for the farmers.

Speakers from different cause-oriented groups like the Central Luzon Aeta
Association (CLAA), Pamalakaya, KMU, Bayan, LFS, Courage and Gabriela took
turns in denouncing the Estrada regime's record of human rights violations,
destruction of the economy, cronyism and Erap's personal propensity for
womanizing and drinking.

The KMU trade union center announced the resumption of noise barrages for a
nationwide pay hike of 125 pesos and against the incessant price
manipulation by the oil cartel of pump prices.

Meanwhile, the Filipino community in Los Angeles led by Bayan International
and Pesante USA are mobilizing a multicultural march in front of the
Philippine consulate in sympathy with the Mendiola massacre victims. #