MANILA (Mindanao Examiner / Nov. 10, 2011) – An umbrella organization of farmers working on Hacienda Luisita owned by President Benigno Aquino’s family has called on the Philippine leader to distribute the vast track of lands to peasants who are beneficiaries of the government’s land reform program.
The Alyansa ng mga Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Luisita (AMBALA) also told the President to face the issue of Aquino’s “dark secret” proliferating on the Internet.
A 15-minute documentary entitled “Aquino Cojuangco: Facts they don’t want you to know,” was uploaded on October 21 and has generated so much interest that it continues to be one of the most viewed videos on YouTube with over half a million views already since the Mindanao Examiner first broke out the story about it on November 5.
The viral video spread to the social networking site Facebook, but government spokesmen branded it as propaganda.
The Unyon ng mga Manggagawa sa Agrikultura (UMA) also dared Aquino to answer the issues of Hacienda Luisita ownership and the return of Aquino oligarchy. “Arrogance and mere statement on the issue will not dissolve doubts. The issue being raised by the viral video was legitimate,” Rodel Mesa, UMA Secretary General, said.
“Before the video was uploaded in the Internet, UMA and other BAYAN-led organization had been raising the awareness of the people regarding the Cojaungco-Aquino’s relentless effort to frustrate and swindle the farm worker beneficiaries of Hacienda Luisita questioning their ownership of the 6, 453 hectares sugar state. In fact there are already documentaries have been made after the November 16, 2004 violent dispersal exposing the Cojuangco’s cling to ownership of the land and their role why the massacre happened in a blow by blow account,” he added.
Mesawas referring to the killings of a dozen picketing farm workers and two children by the police and soldiers guarding the Hacienda Luisita. Over a hundred farmers were also injured in the attacks. The farmers were demanding fair wages and distribution of Hacienda Luisita lands.
The documentary told stories of the Cojuangco matriarch Ysidra, and how she established her business empire and landholdings in the 1900 in Tarlac and nearby provinces. And so was the issue of the controversial Hacienda Luisita.
Ysidra had four sons and one of them was former President Corazon Aquino’s father.
It also noted the huge number of cases of extra-judicial killings and forced disappearances of political activists and farmers during the time of President Corazon Aquino, mother of the present Filipino leader Benigno Aquino.
It told how the clans amassed its wealth in central Luzon and showed how the Cojuangcos and the Aquinos held an iron grip over the political landscape from mayors, governors, congressmen, and senators and up to the presidency over the decades.
Masa said: “The President has all the time in the world to change his image as the new face of oligarchs in the country and an all time land grabber by first give up all their claims to Hacienda Luisita and allow its distribution to the 6,000 farmer beneficiaries of the contested land free and unconditionally.”
“Second as he had forged a social contract to the people his administration should change its habit to appoint and hire relatives and closed friends to any government positions available and give it to government employees who truly deserve the post.”
The filmmaker of the documentary, who identified himself as Filipino artist Baron Buchokoy, said the video is neither an anti-Aquino nor anti-Cojuangco propaganda and that all leads, facts and trivia in the film can be verified on credible sources in the Internet.The documentary also trigged various reactions and calls for political reforms inn the country. “Unbelievable…Ganitong klaseng mga video hindi to kayang gawin ng isang tao. Spread the Truth. Filipino wake up,” one reader, Takeru Miyamato, wrote at the video’s channel site.
“May magagawa ka pa ba sa oligarchy na yan? Ang sagot ay wala. Pero may magagawa ka, support the Constitutional reform. Amend the 1987 Constitution. Support the Federalism-Parliamentary. Itatayo ko buong buhay ko para lang mapalitan ang Konstitusyon natin. Mabuhay ang bansang Pilipinas, mabuhay ang mga Pilipino,” another said. (MindanaoExaminer)
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