Drought-hit farmers block Koronadal highway

SOUTH COTABATO, Philippines – After the Kidapawan rally, Koronadal farmers hit by drought have taken over the Koronadal-General Santos highway to demand rice assistance and seek government intervention in mitigating the effects of El Niño on their crops.

Farmers said they have been experiencing heavy crop losses due to the dry spell, which has hit their province since late November.

They have been picketing along the stretches of Koronadal-General Santos Highway since Saturday, taunting authorities by lying on concrete pavements in shifts to drum up their protest action.

Some farmers have since been displaying the banners of left-leaning party-list groups, waving them high whenever reporters come close.

To prevent disruption of traffic flow, police established a guarded detour for vehicles plying the highway via narrower roads straddling southeast of Koronadal City and South Cotabato’s nearby Tupi and Tampakan towns.

Farmers started picketing on Friday in front of the Department of Agriculture office in Koronadal.

Many of them were carrying placards that appealed to the government to provide them food rations.

Talk and text messages have been circulating in Central Mindanao since Sunday, purporting that the farmers are being manipulated by leftist groups to embark on mass action to embarrass Malacañang and derail the candidacy of administration bets for national and local positions

Maximum tolerance

Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Director General Ricardo Marquez said they would observe maximum tolerance, one of the lessons learned from the bloody clash in Kidapawan City on April 1.

Marquez called on the public, particularly militant groups, to respect police authorities who are only doing their jobs.

“Let them express their legitimate right to protest,” said Marquez in a chance interview with reporters at Camp Crame, Quezon City.

He added that members of militant groups should remember that other people also have the right to use the roads.

Interior and Local Government Secretary Mel Senen Sarmiento said his department is ready to accept complaints or charges stemming from the dispersal of protesters in Kidapawan City last week.

Sarmiento said the DILG is committed to get to the bottom of the bloody protest without fear or favor.

He also gave assurance that the DILG is working hard to extend all the necessary assistance to help farmers and policemen in the bloody incident that left three persons killed and 100 others, mostly policemen, injured.

Still no rice

In Pampanga, the Rural Missionaries of the Philippines (RMP) decried yesterday the failure of the government to distribute rice to hungry farmers affected by El Niño in Mindanao despite available government funds.

“It is public knowledge that they have been devastated by the El Niño phenomenon, worsening their already impoverished state caused by landlessness and lack of livelihood,” RMP national coordinator Sr. Mary Francis Añover said in a statement.

She noted that “at present, tens of thousands of farmers are demanding relief from Mindanao, Negros island and Cagayan Valley.”

“It is ironic that those who cultivate for the country’s food needs still have to barricade a highway to get attention for food aid. This has become a complete picture of government abandonment and Aquino who is President appears not to be his brother’s keeper,” ?the RMP said in a statement.

It said the violent dispersal of farmers in Kidapawan City, North Cotabato last April 1 “did not cow the hungry farmers to sustain their mass actions demanding for relief.”

“If the farmers do not organize themselves and act in unison, they and their families would certainly die of starvation,” Añover said.

The RMP noted that apart from the 6,000 farmers asking for 15,000 sacks of rice from the government, farmers in Bukidnon want 4,200 sacks of rice while those from Koronadal in South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat and Sarangani  demand 15,000 sacks each.

Farmers in General Santos City said they need 8,000 sacks to tide them over in the next days of drought.

RMP also noted that in Negros, farm workers are demanding government aid as they are facing tiempo muerto (dead season), the non-existence of sources of livelihood as their lands are monocropped with sugarcane. 

The dead season in Negros is estimated to affect five million farmers, Añover said.

“Farmers protesting by the tens of thousands is serious and their legitimate demands should not be belittled,” Añover said.

RMP said it has launched a relief mission called  “Food Aid in, Soldiers Out” to gather support for farmers in Mindanao and other regions affected by drought.

“This initiative is to inform and encourage the public that aside from hunger, landlessness, farmers are also the usual victims of militarization and other forms of human rights violations perpetrated by government forces,” the group said.

Farmers blamed the counter-insurgency program of the Aquino administration, Oplan Bayanihan, for the “systematic abuse” and demanded justice for the victims.

“We appreciate that the massive number of poor farmers are now mobilizing under their cry, ‘Land, Food and Justice,’ as they are their fundamental concerns. Hence, it is our utmost duty to ask Aquino, why the inaction? Why the callousness?” Añover said. ?– With Cecille Suerte Felipe, Ding Cervantes