Peasants launched a protest on Panay Island on June 10, the 38th anniversary of the bogus Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP). They held the action at Jaro Cathedral, Iloilo City, led by Paghugpong sang Mangunguma sa Panay kag Guimaras (Pamanggas, or Alliance of Farmers of Panay and Guimaras), the regional chapter of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (Philippine Peasant Movement).

Farmers carried candles and demanded, “Defend the land, and protect the human rights of farmers!” They exposed the real conditions of peasants in Panay and revealed CARP’s inutility.

They said the program did not help them; its high amortization and insufficient support for local production worsened their poverty. Instead, CARP allowed wealthy hacenderos, landlords, and developers to seize the land after small farmers were forced to sell.

“Regimes pass, but the chains of feudalism remain,” Pamanggas said. The bogus CARP is currently compounded by SPLIT or Support to Parcelization of Lands for Individual Titling and other Marcos regime programs that burden farmers.

Beyond these policies, peasants also suffer from militarization in the countryside. Pamanggas said peasants’ lives are threatened by surveillance, fabricated cases, planting of evidence, bombings, and other human-rights violations committed by the military.

“But when contradictions between peasants and the reactionary state intensify, mass anti-feudal and anti-militarization campaigns also grow stronger,” Pamanggas said.

One campaign of the peasant movement on Panay and Guimaras is defending Pamanggas chairperson Lucia Capaducio, who faces the military’s harassment and red-tagging. Peasants officially launched the “Hands Off Lucia Capaducio” campaign concurrent with the protest.

Pamanggas held the action simultaneous with a Quezon City protest by hundreds of peasants led by the KMP.