THE militant peasant group Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) on Thursday assailed plans by the Department of Agrarian Reform to use the multibillion coco levy funds for what it described as the sham Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

“Using small coconut farmers’ money for the sham CARP is totally revolting and highly unacceptable. Agrarian Reform Secretary Virgilio delos Reyes should not dare touch our money as this would hasten his ouster from the Department of Agrarian Reform,” KMP deputy secretary general Willy Marbella, said in a statement.

“We will never allow the Aquino administration to use small coconut farmers’ money against farmers themselves. The Aquino administration would once again steal our plundered money,” he added.

Milking cow
Marbella insisted that using the coco levy funds for the sham CARP will only benefit big landlords, like the Cojuangco-Aquinos and corrupt officials.

The KMP has been pushing for the immediate cash distribution of the coco levy funds in the form of social benefits to small coconut farmers, like pension, medical and educational benefits, among others.

The peasant group is also pushing for the junking of the bogus CARP and is demanding the enactment of House Bill 374 or the genuine agrarian reform bill, which seeks the “free distribution of lands to landless tillers.”

“24 years of the bogus CARP failed to address the monopoly of big landlords over vast tracts of lands. Instead, landlessness and land-grabbing suffered by farmers worsened,” Marbella said.

“Only a genuine agrarian reform program that will break the monopoly and control of big landlords over vast tracts of lands and haciendas and its subsequent free distribution to landless tillers will solve the centuries-old landlessness of peasants in the country,” the peasant leader added.