Published by: INQUIRER.net by Maila Ager
Date Published: 01/21/2008
News Editorial: Farmers’ Day’–Beltran
MANILA, Philippines — To honor the 13 farmers killed during a march on Malacañang 21 years ago, a leftist lawmaker is urging the immediate passage of a measure declaring January 22 “National Farmers’ Day.” The farmers were killed when security forces opened fire on the protest march to demand genuine agrarian reform on January 22, 1987, in what is now known as the Mendiola massacre for the bridge leading to the Palace.
Anakpawis Representative Crispin Beltran, principal author of House Bill 1725, said the bill should be passed because the farmers’ present struggle for genuine reform has assumed a “historical dimension and social significance similar to Andres Bonifacio’s struggle for independence against our colonial masters.”“The Mendiola massacre is a hallmark of that struggle, so it is just fitting that we honor that moment in our history in the same manner that we have honored Andres Bonifacio and the struggle for genuine freedom and democracy,” Beltran said in a statement on Monday.
Declaring January 22 National Farmers’ Day, the lawmaker said, would serve as a reminder that the struggle for genuine reform and social justice remains an “unfinished business of our social nation.”Besides its historical significance, Beltran said it has become a tradition for farmers to march to Mendiola every January 22, not only to demand justice for the 13 victims of the 1987 massacre, but also to advance their call for genuine agrarian reform.
In relation to this, the Anakpawis solon criticized what he described as the military and police’s “overkill preparation” for the protest action to be spearheaded by militant farmers on Tuesday, 21st anniversary of the Mendiola massacre. Authorities have declared a red alert over Metro Manila and are expected to deploy as many as 10,000 soldiers and policemen, claiming that a destabilization plot is set to be mounted in time with the leftist protests.
But Beltran said likened this preparation to rubbing salt on the wounds of the dead farmers and the survivors of the Mendiola Massacre. “While farmers are demanding justice and solutions to their perennial demands, this government is responding with terror tactics and violence,” he said.
Reaction:
I agree to the making of January 22 as National Farmers’ Day. I think as of the moment this is the least that the government can do. But then, I don’t believe it will suffice to give justice to all those farmers who died during that Mendiola massacre. Declaring a certain date a holiday could never bring back those lives taken by the pit of prejudices in our country. The government should provide the solution as a full response to their long lived wish for a full implementation of the agrarian reform. To which government agency, Department of Agrarian Reform, should be able to lead in the implementation of agrarian reform & sustainable development in the country through land tenure improvement and the provision of integrated development services to landless farmers, farm workers and small-landowners-cultivators & the delivery of agrarian justice as key to long lasting peace and development of the countryside.