Tagle joins 29 bishops backing land reform now
Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle. NIÑO JESUS ORBETA
Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle has joined 29 other bishops in a petition requesting a dialogue between President Benigno Aquino and farmers demanding the completion of the agrarian reform program launched 24 years ago by his mother, the late President Corazon Aquino, before it expires in 2014.
One of the prelates who earlier signed up was Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma, president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP). The 100-strong CBCP will hold next month its semiannual meeting, which usually tackles national policy issues.
The snowballing support by the bishops to the June 1 letter sent to Mr. Aquino was announced on Wednesday by the Church-run Radio Veritas as some 5,000 farmers and their sympathizers prepared for a march on Malacañang on Friday.
They include several hundreds who had come to Manila from various agricultural estates in Negros Occidental and Mindanao by marching since Friday and taking ferries to ports in Batangas City and Manila.
“We’re not going back home until we get a firm commitment from President Aquino. We don’t care anymore what happens to us, whether we starve to death or get jailed,” said Alberto Jaime, a farmer who had marched all the way from Negros Occidental.
The letter to Aquino was prepared by Manila Auxiliary Bishop Broderick Pabillo, head of the CBCP’s National Secretariat for Social Action, and Fr. Marlon Lacal, executive director of the Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines.
Pabillo told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that the letter was sent to Malacañang on Friday but that there had been no reply from Palace officials. Mr. Aquino left for London on Monday on an official visit and met with Prime Minister David Cameron.
Palace spokesperson Edwin Lacierda said the President had instructed Agrarian Reform Secretary Virgilio de los Reyes and Budget Secretary Florencio Abad to meet with the farmers.
Other bishops endorse petition
Radio Veritas said that among those who had endorsed the petition were Bacolod Bishop Vicente Navarra, Cabanatuan Bishop Sofronio Bangcud, Tagum Bishop Wilfredo Manlapaz, San Pablo Bishop Leo Drona, Sorsogon Bishop Arturo Bastes, Infanta Bishop Rolando Tria Tirona, Kidapawan Bishop Romulo dela Cruz, Iloilo Archbishop Angel Lagdameo, Lipa Archbishop Ramon Arguelles, Malolos Bishop Jose Oliveros and Cotabato Archbishop Orlando Quevedo.
Pabillo said the letter was sent in an “email blast” on Friday to the bishops, many of whose dioceses are in remote and inaccessible areas of the archipelago.
DAR ‘underperforming’
The letter slammed the Department of Agrarian Reform under Mr. Aquino for “consistently underperforming” in implementing Carper, the five-year extension of Mrs. Aquino’s Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).
In a text message to the Inquirer on Tuesday, Abad said Mr. Aquino planned to fully implement Carper before he stepped down in 2016. He said that notices of coverage would be issued before Carper expires in 2014 and that these cases would be later pursued.
In an interview with the Inquirer on Monday, Pabillo said Mr. Aquino had not personally addressed the CARP since he assumed the presidency in spite of an election campaign promise that he would fully implement the project his mother initiated in 1988 as the centerpiece of a program to lift millions of Filipinos from poverty and remove one of the major causes of a festering communist insurgency.
Pabillo lamented that the President, whose family owns the sprawling Hacienda Luisita in Tarlac, had not shown enthusiasm for the program.
He noted that the DAR had not moved swiftly to implement the Supreme Court’s decision last November 22 ordering the distribution of the hacienda to its 6,000 workers, ostensibly waiting for a clear signal from Mr. Aquino.
DAR budget cuts
The Carper extension law passed in 2009 called for a five-year outlay of P150 billion. This year, Malacañang cut a DAR request for a P30-billion budget, approving instead only P18 billion. The Palace also nixed an additional request of P4.9 billion for technical support and credits for beneficiaries. Demoralization has hit DAR personnel with Malacañang’s plan to dismantle the DAR in two years, according to a senior DAR official.
The marchers from Mindanao and Negros Occidental reached Manila Wednesday. They were to stay overnight at San Carlos Seminary and then proceed to Caritas Manila in Pandacan today for Friday’s march on Malacañang.
Representatives of the farmers and Task Force Mapalad, the civil society advocacy group which organized the march, on Wednesday met with former Senator Aquilino Pimentel Jr. in Makati City.
“A big number of our population comes from the poor. So if the President fulfills his promise to the poor, a greater number of our people will benefit from the fulfillment of that,” Pimentel said. “Politicians make a lot of promises. He could forget all the promises he made, but not the one he made to the farmers.”
The Save the Agrarian Reform Alliance, an umbrella of farmers’ groups, on Wednesday called on Mr. Aquino to wield his political power just like what he did when he backed the ouster of Chief Justice Renato Corona, to speed up the agrarian reform process.
“He must walk the talk,” the group said. “Since Aquino took office he had not mentioned anything about agrarian reform targets; not even in his first and second State of the Nation Addresses.” With a report from Kristine L. Alave
