‘Dummy’ Luisita beneficaries named

Militant farmers on Friday named five people included in the preliminary list of Hacienda Luisita who they claimed were actually working in the horse stables of President Aquino’s relatives.

Responding to the challenge of Agrarian Secretary Virgilio delos Reyes, farmers belonging to the leftist Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) identified them as Contacio G. Lundang, Rector G. Lundang, Antonio A. Claridad, Pedro A. Claridad, and Rodrigo A. Claridad, saying they were actually workers in the Cojuangco family’s stables of Australian-bred horses.

The KMP said the information came from the Alyansa ng mga Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Luisita (Ambala) and United Luisita Workers’ Union (Ulwu), which scrutinized the initial list released by the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) last month.

Barefaced scam

“The inclusion of Cojuangco loyalists and dummies in the DAR’s list of beneficiaries is exactly the reason why the DAR’s so-called verification process is a scam and a barefaced maneuver by the President’s family to once again evade land distribution,” KMP deputy secretary general Randall Echanis said in a statement.

Equally responsible

“Secretary Delos Reyes should stop pretending that he has nothing to do with these listings. Delos Reyes and the DAR are equally responsible and liable in this latest brazen attempt to deceive and deny Hacienda Luisita farmworkers of their rights to own the lands,” Echanis said.

But Delos Reyes said if it were his intention to “put one over on them,” then he would not have released the preliminary list in the first place.

“All they need to do is issue an affidavit to us to raise their objections about these people, then after we have gotten their side, we will decide on whether to strike them off the list,” he said.

He stressed that the list was preliminary and would only be finalized once the inclusion-exclusion process was completed by the end of November.

On Oct. 31, the DAR issued a preliminary list of 5,365 farmworkers who will receive parcels of agricultural land from Hacienda Luisita, the country’s biggest sugar estate owned by Mr. Aquino’s family.

Another set of 1,221 farm workers, on the other hand, was placed under a provisional list due to deficiencies in documentary evidence to prove the validity of their claim.

But KMP alleged that some dubious claimants, such as the Cojuangco workers, were added to the preliminary list, while many legitimate farm workers were placed in the provisional list.

In 1988, when the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program took effect, Hacienda Luisita offered an option to own shares of stock instead of

land to the farmers, sparking a long court battle.

In May the Supreme Court upheld with finality the decision of the Presidential Agrarian Reform Council in 2005 to scrap the stock distribution option and to order the distribution of 4,915 hectares of Hacienda Luisita to 6,296 farmworkers.