THE Senate committee on agrarian reform is
conducting a thorough review of the 20-year-old Comprehensive
Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) to determine if it should be
extended beyond June 10, 2008.
The Lower House measure has already passed a
consolidation of 13 bills for a five year extension of CARP
funded by P100 billion.
"The option is to put it simply: one,
extension; second, extension with reforms; if it is extended,
for how long and how much would its funding be? Or termination.
But there should be alternatives," said Sen. Gregorio Honasan,
chair of the Senate agrarian reform panel.
Honasan assured all stakeholders that every
aspect on the issue is being looked into. The committee had
conducted at least three consultation meetings recently in
Cagayan de Oro, Legazpi and Roxas City. Honasan admitted that
CARP's implementation in the past 20 years has not been
encouraging, a major point in ongoing debates over the proposal
to extend the program.
"Hindi totally negative, may gains naman.
Hindi rin encouraging. Ibig sabihin kailangan nasa focus tayo
this time. If you notice, we have not been visible articulating
our position because we are a receptacle of the inputs. Like the
Sumilao farmers, we met them, my representatives met them. We
met the local government and the San Miguel people without
prejudice to executive action. Para bukas ang kaisipan natin.
Ang objectives namin ay upliftment of the farmers and their
families," Honasan said.
He said the Senate is inclined to support an
extension of three to seven years. "The consensus really is to
support the extension but ang pinakamatingkad na issue is to
enhance the support services. It is not enough that we
redistribute the land in the true spirit of land reform but
re-distribute also the means of production and support services
like irrigation."
Honasan said the Senate will reconcile its
preference for three to seven years' extension with the
House-approved five years, and try to correct previous lapses in
monitoring and auditing mechanisms.
In a pre-summit meeting at UP Diliman
yesterday, several farmers' organization, civil society groups,
businessmen, government officials and the Catholic Bishops
Conference of the Philippines sought to clarify positions and
set a consensus on the issue of CARP extension.
Output of workshops held in the pre-summit
will be presented today at the Bishops-Legislators Caucus at the
Pope Pius XII Center in Malate, Manila
Cagayan de Oro Bishop Antonio Ledesma said in
the pre-summit that they are happy over the House's extension of
CARP and are hoping the Senate would follow suit. He said CARP's
extension is a CBCP priority.
At the same pre-summit, some 30 members of
the militant farmers' group Task Force Mapalad dramatized their
call for the early resolution of their land cases in Negros,
Batangas and Bukidnon and the immediate extension of a reformed
CARP by running naked at the UP campus wearing only rice sacks.
"Sinisimbulo nito ang aming paglaya sa
pagkatali sa lupa. Ang pagpapalawig sa CARP ay daan upang
makamit namin ang lupa," TFM president Jose Rodito Angeles said,
adding that another five years of CARP with all the support
services that farmers need will lead to improved lives for the
farmers.
TFM is also pushing DAR to act on the pending land cases in
the Arroyo-owned Haciendas Bacan, Grande and Paraiso in Negros
Occidental, the Hermino Teves land in Negros Oriental, the
Henessy property in San Juan, Batangas, and the Fortich Farms in
Malaybalay, Bukidnon. - JP Lopez and Randy Nobleza
