3,000 farmers claim victory in land battle

Sugarcane workers claimed ownership of a 2,930-hectare farm land in Nasugbu, Batangas, following the Supreme Court’s final ruling that upheld the distribution of land titles to 1,301 farmers almost two decades ago.

On Friday, around 3,000 farm workers and their supporters joined the 25-kilometer “victory march,” a motorcade of 60 trucks and 100 motorcycles from Daang Pulo to Nasugbu town proper in Batangas.

The farmers, who belonged to two local organizations Damayan ng mga Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Roxas-National Federation of Sugar Workers and the Katipunan ng mga Magbubukid sa Hacienda Roxas Inc., welcomed the Supreme Court’s final decision in February that put an end to the 18-year-old battle over Hacienda Roxas.

Haciena Roxas covers three haciendas, namely Hacienda Palico (1,024 ha), Banilad (1,050 ha), and Caylaway (about 867 ha), sprawling over nine villages in Nasugbu. The land previously belonged to sugar conglomerate Roxas & Co. Inc. that also owned vast sugarcane plantations in Negros.

Aya Jallorina, executive director of the Association of Women for Agrarian Reform Development and Empowerment (Awardee), umbrella organization of the two groups, described the farmers fight for the property as a “long battle (of) seemingly endless mass actions and camp-outs, long marches to government agencies, and repeated dialogues and pleadings.”

She said it started in October 1993 when the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) distributed the certificates of land ownership awards to the farm tillers, in accordance with the 1988 Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

Roxas & Co. Inc. filed a series of petitions and appeal for CARP exemption to DAR in 1993 and 2002, and to the Court of Appeals in 2006, on the grounds that a zoning ordinance classified the property as industrial, commercial, and residential, and a 1975 presidential proclamation that classified Nasugbu as a tourist zone.

All petitions were dismissed, giving the farmers a win “in the first round of battle,” said lawyer Nenita Mahinay, a former sugar farm worker herself, who served as the farmers’ legal counsel.

In 2009, the sugar company filed another motion to the Supreme Court prompting an oral argument at the court’s en banc.

The court’s ruling in December 2009 favored the farmers, because “you cannot classify the entire Nasugbu as a tourist zone but only some parts of it,” Mahinay said in a phone interview.

In January 2010, Roxas & Co. Inc. filed a motion for reconsideration, which the Supreme Court responded with an entry of judgment in February this year.

“I think this has a big impact on other farm workers fighting for their lands. I myself could hardly believe this. I think the main ingredient here is the advocacy,” Jallorina said.