Estate workers put up barricade
LUCENA CITY— Workers of Hacienda Matias barricaded the gate of the coconut farming estate with drums and carabaos on Friday, preventing government, military and police officers from accompanying farmers to lots awarded to them under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).
Guillermo Catandihan, an hacienda overseer, said in a phone interview with the Inquirer that the workers were ready to die to protect the estate from “outsiders.”
The 1,715-hectare Hacienda Matias in San Francisco town in southern Quezon province is covered by seven land titles and has already been placed under CARP, according to records of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR). Last year, land covered by three titles were already given out to 283 farmer beneficiaries.
Parcels covered by the remaining titles are now in the name of the government and awaiting distribution to other beneficiaries.
On Friday, Agrarian Reform Undersecretary for Legal Affairs Luis Meinrado Pangulayan, along with representatives from the Department of Justice and the Department of the Interior and Local Government, court sheriff, police and soldiers, went to the hacienda in Barangay Butanglad and Don Juan Vercelos to start installing holders of the DAR-issued Certificates of Land Ownership Award (Cloas).
The government representatives, however, were unable to open the obstructed gate and were forced to cut the barbed-wire fence to gain entry. DAR officials later claimed the successful installation of 23 beneficiaries.
Maribel Luzara, president of Kilusang Magbubukid ng Bondoc Peninsula (KMBP), said in a phone interview on Monday that the hacienda workers were still ruling the place and that state forces seemed helpless to enforce the law.
Saying that the government has failed to protect the rights of land reform beneficiaries, over 100 farmers will return their Cloas to President Aquino and the DAR on Tuesday, Luzara said. KMBP officials will hand a letter to the President in Malacañang to tell him of their decision, she added.
