Workers to SC: pro-farmers decision on HLI now!

Workers called on the Supreme Court to decisively put an end to the five-year agrarian dispute between Hacienda Luisita farmers and the family of President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III and to settle the case in favor of the former, saying justice has been delayed and denied on the case.

According to labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU), if the Supreme Court would only be true to being an independent body administering a just and fair trial on the case, there is no more reason for any delay in finalizing a pro-farmer decision.

“The agrarian dispute in Hacienda Luisita has been going on not only for five years but for decades already. It is high time that the Supreme Court end this by coming up with a pro-farmer decision – and resisting any meddling from the president who’s obviously standing by his family on this issue,” said Elmer “Bong” Labog, chairperson of KMU.

“The Filipino workers, farmers and people have every reason to believe that the release of the SC decision on the Luisita issue, which has already been penned, is being delayed due to pressures coming from Pres. Aquino himself. After all, it didn’t take long after Aquino was sworn in as president before the government intervened to keep the Luisita lands in the hands of the Aquinos through the infamous compromise agreement,” Labog added.

The wait for the release of the SC decision on the Luisita case coincides with the enactment of Republic Act 6657 or the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law (CARL) in June 7, 1988 under former Pres. Cory Aquino’s administration.

“We are awaiting the decision of the Supreme Court on the Luisita case in time for the commemoration of the 23rd anniversary of the passage of the anti-farmer CARL. It is proof of the CARL’s anti-farmer thrust that Luisita farmers and the Filipino people still had to bring their struggle for land to the Supreme Court,” Labog said.

“Twenty-three years after the CARL was approved, the Luisita farmers and the Filipino people are still struggling for a piece of land that has already been proven to rightly belong to the farmers. The CARL, indeed, prevented Luisita farmers, as well as farmers all over the country, from owning land, reaping the fruits of their labor, and liberating themselves from landlord rule,” he added.###