Farmers, peasant leaders, agricultural workers and rural folks from Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao converged at the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) office at Elliptical Road in Quezon City this early evening for the Pambansang Lakbayan ng Magsasaka para sa Lupa at Laban sa Pasismo (National Peasant Caravan for Land and Against Fascism).
Dubbed as #LakbayMagsasaka, the peasant protest caravan nationwide traveled to Manila with the main objective to assert genuine land reform through free land distribution, to demand justice and to hold accountable President Rodrigo Duterte for the continuing peasant killings.
“The Philippine peasant movement hails October as Peasant Month. It is a time to highlight the concerns of the Filipino farmers and celebrate the gains it has achieved in its struggle for land,” said Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas Secretary General Antonio Flores.
Around 2,000 farmers from Bicol and Southern Luzon today joined hundreds of farmers from Mindanao camped outside DAR. Farmers from Central Luzon and Cagayan Valley are set to arrive tomorrow.
“We will resist and fight the terror that emanates from Malacañang, especially now that Duterte himself has threatened to pull the trigger on anyone that he considers as drug suspects and criminals and lumped legitimate protests as destabilization,” Flores added.
According to human rights alliance Karapatan, they documented 98 victims of political killings under the current administration as of September 30, 2017; 91 of them are peasants. Many of those killed belong to local farmers’ organizations that have stood for their land and rights, as well as led campaigns against the militarization of their communities. Perpetrators of killings were allegedly soldiers, police personnel, paramilitary groups and private armies of landlords.
“Not a single case was investigated nor solved. We demand justice for the victims of peasant political killings and extrajudicial killings,” Flores uttered.
Farmers and peasant leaders nationwide would camp outside DAR for a couple of days. They would march to Mendiola on Wednesday, October 25, to be joined by the Coalition for Land, Against Martial Law and Oppression (CLAMOR), a formation composed of church-based institutions, farmers, academe, youth and other sectors.
The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines National Secretariat for Social Action (CBCP-NASSA) and the Movement Against Tyranny (MAT) have also expressed support for the peasant-led mobilization.
“We enjoin the public to join and unite with thousands of farmers who traveled from their communities to Manila. The rallies will be the culmination of nationally-coordinated actions and month-long peasant caravan and protests led by farmers,” Flores ended.
