WE CONDEMN the massacre of nine sugarcane workers, including four women and two minors, in Hacienda Nene, Barangay Bulanon, Sagay City, Negros Occidental on Oct. 20, 2018.
While resting in a hut around 9 p.m., armed men strafed them with bullets. According to initial reports, there were indications that most victims were shot in the head and three were burned.
The victims, who were all members of the National Federation of Sugarcane Workers, together with other landless farmers of Hacienda Nene, had just begun their land cultivation activity or bungkalan in the 75 hectares area of land. The said land is confirmed to be covered by the government’s agrarian reform program yet remains to be undistributed.
It’s as if it is not enough that farm workers in plantations, including those in Hacienda Nene, have been suffering from awful and slave-like conditions, receiving pay far below the living wage and becoming consistent targets of intimidations and red-tagging in order to delegitimize their struggles. This recent brutal killings of farmers just in time for the National Peasant Month and amidst soaring prices of rice and inflation merely reflects the apathy and atrocity towards farmers who toil to feed us every day.
The nine massacred farm workers add up to the 163 peasants killed since July 1, 2016 according to the Center for Trade Union and Human Rights. Undeniably, the malicious and irresponsible tagging of peasants and workers’ organizations, human rights defenders, and dissenters as “communists” has led to escalating attacks on their civil and political rights.
We view with concern the statement of the Negros Occidental police that one of the slain victims was armed with a .38 handgun. Is this an attempt to use “tokhang-style” planting of evidence to turn the tables and justify the brutal attack?
The unfolding of events over the past week which include the illegal arrest of labor and peasant organizers in separate incidents in Laguna and Nueva Ecija, abduction of two activists in Central Luzon and massacre of nine Negros sugar workers indicate how human rights are shamelessly disrespected and gravely violated. For farmers and peasants, these attacks are all but reasons to tirelessly continue the struggle for just wages, dignified work and genuine land reform.
We add our voice in demanding justice for the “Sagay 9” and supports an independent investigation to bring the perpetrators to justice.
