HUNDREDS of farmers on Monday started an eight-day march from Quezon province to Quezon City to dramatize their concerns on the rural poor—land rights, agrarian reform, right to food and coco levy.
Buhay na may Dignidad para sa Lahat or Dignidad Alliance said the farmers will make the “Walk for Land, Right to Food, Livelihoods, the Full Recovery of Coco Levy Fund and a Life of Dignity for All” from Sariaya, Quezon, to the Department of Agrarian Reform office in Quezon City from April 12 to 20.
“This is an important and symbolic expression of grassroots people’s demand for a life of dignity. We supports this farmers-led activity to demand for right to food, as well as other social-protection measures, which will ensure a life of dignity for all,” Dignidad said in a statement.
The group also expressed solidarity with the farmers who protested in Kidapawan City, North Cotabato, and condemned the alleged police brutality in the dispersal operations.
Land distribution in the Philippines, Ric Reyes of Walden Bello-Dignidad Campaign said, “barely” moved under the current administration despite the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with Reforms (Carper).
“Last year” accomplishment of only 30,000 hectares out of the target of 205,000 hectares shows the depth of Carper implementation paralysis,” he said. Jojo Clavo of Katarungan said that the P200-billion coco-levy fund is another major issue that has a big impact on farmers.
“The coco-levy fund portion recovered so far, estimated at more than P76 billion, is still unutilized due to the failure of Congress to legislate the proposed coconut-levy trust fund bill. Meanwhile, Executive Orders 179 and 180 on the coco-levy funds issued by President Aquino in March 2015, which could have already benefited the farmers are still stuck at the Supreme Court after a group identified closely with [San Miguel Corp. Chairman Eduardo] ‘Danding’ Cojuangco was granted a temporary restraining order,” Clavo explained.
Rene Ofreneo, Dignidad spokesman and chairman of the Integrated Rural Development Foundation, expressed support for the farmers in Quezon in demanding the immediate return of coco-levy funds to the farmers.
“Many of the original contributors to the fund are now old, sick and dying. To this day, they have not received any of the benefits of their own money that has been promised to them,” he said.
The coco-levy assets now estimated at about P83 billion, the Presidential Commission on Good Government said, consist of P73 billion in cash (liquidated shares from SMC) and P10 billion in shares of stock in the United Coconut Planters Bank and oil mills operated by the Coconut Industry Investment Fund.
More than 20 million coconut farmers and their families from around 21,000 coconut-producing villages across the country are expected to benefit from the fund.
Dignidad Spokesman Ana Maria R. Nemenzo, who is also chairman of the Integrated Rural Development Foundation, said Lakbay-Dignidad highlights the “crucial need” for adequate food and regular jobs, humane housing, reliable health care, free education up to tertiary level, living pension and safe and efficient public transportation.
Lakbay-Dignidad is a combination of a caravan, march and mobile public-information activities in parts of Northern, Central and Southern Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao from April to May.