At this moment in time, a group of farmers from Sumilao, Bukidnon is walking all the away to Malacañang. It is the third occasion a vivid mass action of this level was set up by this group but this instance it is so emotionally overloaded and hence theatrical. However a sharp scrutiny into the event, I am getting more encourage to believe that the true problem was the agrarian reform law itself. Remembering Ruben Torres, a former Labor Secretary during Ramos presidency and a former activist himself said; “In law, what is important is that you stand by the law and not whether you are affluent or underprivileged”.
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Reports shows that CLOA (Certificate of Land Ownership Award) certificates for a sixty-five (65) hectares have been granted to the farmers’ leaders of the this group from an adjacent property owned by the Carlos family, this same group MAPALAD (Mapadayonong Panaghiusa sa mga Lumad Alang sa Damlag ) and SALFA (San Vicente Landless Farmers Association) now wants the one hundred forty-four (144) hectares Quisumbing land again, unfortunately a glimpse at the requirement of the CARP law they are found not eligible as recipients since they were not the actual occupants of the disputed land, not tenants, or either workers and farmhand in the site but are seasonal recruits contracted in a specific period of time for specific kind of works in the land.
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NQSRMDC (NQ Sr. Management and Development Corp.) controlled by the Quisumbing family of Cebu in 1970 get hold of the property from the Salvador Carlos and his family and after the acquisition rent it out to Philippine Packing Corp. (Del Monte) and on March 29, 1996, the Quisumbings secured from the Office of the President (Ramos) an approval for conversion of the land to agro-industrial/institutional usage, this reversed the DAR’s verdict previous disapproval of the conversion. The case was brought to the Supreme Court whereby the court rules upholding the approval by the Office of the President of the conversion of the property subjected to a Land Reform Petition by the MAPALAD petitioners. The tribunal denied the motion for intervention filed by the petitioners and confirms that the petitioners were “merely recommendee farmer beneficiaries” and not real parties in interest. It denied with finality the motions for reconsideration filed by the petitioners on April 19, 1999. It also ruled that the Sumilao property does not fall within the definition of “agricultural lands” under the CARP law and another element is that the beneficiaries must be tenants, farmers, or landless farm workers and neither of these elements describe the petitioners.
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Information from the DAR also long-established that the MAPALAD lobbyists are agrarian reform recipients of at least 66 hectares of the Carlos estate bordering the Sumilao property, contrary to their claims in their caravan posters that they are landless.