Balay Mindanaw Foundation, Inc.

Kaangayan, Kalambuan, Kalinaw ... sa Mindanaw, sa Pilipinas, sa Kalibutan

10 years later, Mapalad farmers still didn’t get their land
Froilan Gallardo / MindaNews
Posted 20 September 2007 (First published here)

	A Mapalad farmer 10 years later.  Photo: Froilan Gallardo / MindaNews

SUMILAO, Bukidnon (MindaNews/19 Sep) -- Ten years after they staged hunger strikes and stormed the halls of Congress, Sumilao farmers still did not get their lands under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Act of 1988.

What is worse, the 144-hectare land in barangay San Vicente in Sumilao which the farmers wanted was sold by its owner, Norberto Quisumbing Sr., to business tycoon and former ally of late President Ferdinand Marcos, Eduardo Cojuangco, according to Kaloy Manlupig of Balay Mindanaw Foundation, Inc. (BMFI).

"This is highly anomalous. Quisumbing even managed to convert the land to industrial use, exempting it from CARP," Manlupig said.

He said the plight of the Sumilao farmers is a classic case on how the vaunted government agrarian reform program had became a failure.

He said farmers from Negros Island and elsewhere in the country are still struggling to get their lands promised by the government years ago.

Many of the leaders among the Sumilao farmers have aged through time and their children have taken the cudgels of providing leadership and direction of the struggle.

A child joins the struggle.  Photo: Froilan Gallardo / MindaNews

"I used to be a young teenager painting posters and streamers. I used to see it as a fight of my father," said Napoleon Merida Jr. He was only 13 when his father and fellow farmers staged hunger strikes in Cagayan de Oro and outside the office of the Department of Agrarian Reform in Quezon City for 28 days in 1997.

Merida said he was also beside his father when armed farm guards harassed their picket lines in San Vicente.

"Little by little, I learned that they are fighting for our right to get our land. I became actively involved since then," he said.

The face of the Sumilao farmers in 1997, Linda Ligmon, now sports gray hair. But she remained steadfast in her resolve that one day the 144-hectare land in barangay San Vicente will become theirs.

"We have been fighting for so many years. We have become older but our children are slowly taking over the leadership. The fight will continue even after we will be gone," Ligmon said.

It was the black-and-white picture of a weeping Ligmon, with firsts raised, that caught the attention of non-government organizations who came to provide help. It was taken by SunStar Cagayan de Oro photojournalist Joey Nacalaban.

Since then, Ligmon became the image of the Sumilao farmers' struggle.

	Linda Ligmon: The "face" of the Sumilao farmers, whose picture in the news moved NGOs to help.  Photo: Froilan Gallardo / MindaNews

Former President Fidel V. Ramos provided a “win-win solution” to the Sumilao problem, directing the division of the disputed land with 100 hectares to be given to the farmers and the remaining 44 hectares to Quisumbing.

But a year later, the Supreme Court ruled the presidential decision "void."

Ligmon said the farmers, whose numbers have grown from 74 to 172 at present, is now living on a 66-hectare land beside the disputed Quisumbing estate.

She said the 66-hectare land was voluntarily donated by its landowner, Salvador Carlos, who asked the DAR to sell it to the Sumilao farmers at low rates.

"If not for Carlos's kindness we would have no land to till here," Ligmon said.

He said that last Sunday, two policemen and four soldiers entered the 66-hectare land occupied by the Sumilao farmers and searched for documents. The policemen and soldiers left but not before partaking the boiled camote prepared by the farmers for their dinner.

John Maruhom, DAR regional director for Region 10, promised the farmers that he would send a letter to the DAR head office questioning why Quisumbing was allowed to sell the disputed land.