Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan)-Cavite and Katipunan ng mga Samahang Magbubukid sa Timog Katagalugan (Kasama TK) condemned Ferdinand Marcos Jr on July 2 for showcasing ₱20/kilo rice in Bacoor City. Marcos personally went to the city’s Zapote-Bacoor Public Market to launch the “Benteng Bigas, Meron Na!” program.

On that day, the regime could only sell 500 sacks of rice at the price of ₱20/kilo. The rice available for sale was extremely limited, and only each of the 2,500 residents could buy 10 kilos.

“Only a disillusioned man, especially the likes of Marcos, believes that he can fool the people by showcasing the ‘PHP20 per kilo rice initiative‘ and Kadiwa markets,” Bayan-Cavite said. The group stated that the people know this is just for show, especially amid rising prices of goods, shrinking wages, and the aggressive conversion of productive land.

They said that instead of providing real solutions, Marcos keeps the public going in circles with band-aid solutions. “There is no funding for production subsidies, no genuine land reform, and farmers cannot sell their palay at fair prices because farmgate prices are extremely low,” Kasama-TK stated.

The group also denounced the Marcos regime’s intensified rice importation and set of neoliberal policies that burden farmers. Accompanying this policy are rampant demolitions, livelihood seizures, and widespread evictions in the name of “development projects.”

According to Kasama-TK, while the poor are drowned in fake and meager assistance, demolitions of fishing and urban poor communities continue to make way for projects such as the Cavite-Laguna Expressway, LRT-1 Cavite Extension, Bacoor and Diamond Reclamation Project of Frabelle Fishing Corporation, and vast subdivisions like the Villar family’s Camella Homes in Imus, Dasmariñas, General Trias, and Bacoor.

The two groups called the Marcos regime’s showcase program a “huge insult” to the Cavite masses. “Rice theathrics will not deceived us. Kadiwa do not have enough to feed us. The people of Cavite do not demand alms, but just wages, food on the table, production subsidies, and security in housing,” Kasama-TK emphasized.