The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) and democratic sectors commemorated the 38th anniversary of the bloody Mendiola Massacre on January 22. They held a forum in Bantayog ng mga Bayani to remember the 13 individuals who died after then president Corazon Aquino’s armed forces violently attacked thousands of protesting farmers, almost four decades ago. This was followed by a march to Mendiola in Manila where the heinous crime took place.

Several regimes have passed but justice remains elusive to the massacre victims. Concurrently, their call for genuine land reform has still not been achieved.

“The issues fought by the marchers in Mendiola prevail. Until now farmers have no land nor justice,” according to KMP. These issues include the lack of support for farm workers, sugar farmworkers, vegetables and rice farmers ravaged by successive typhoons, along with all other farmers suffering from high prices of services and goods.

The KMP also pointed out that farmers continue to face extrajudicial killings and militarization of their communities. They suffer widespread land grabbing and land use conversion of hectares of agricultural land.

Political dynasties perpetuate landlessness, rural poverty and inequality in the country, according to the KMP. It exemplified the bureaucratic-capitalist families of Marcos, Duterte, Villar and others who have enriched themselves from land use conversion and neoliberal policies such as the Rice Liberalization law.

From 10.3 million hectares in 1986, only 7.27 million hectares of agricultural land remain by 2022. Worse, rice growing land fell by up to half from 3.6 million hectares in 1980 to just 1.9 hectares in 2012. The latest state statistics record only 21.8 of the general agricultural population owns land in 2022.

“We will not stop fighting for land, livelihood, and human rights,” KMP chairperson emeritus Rafael Mariano promised. “The memory of those killed in the Mendiola Massacre remains an inspiration in our movement for land and justice.”