Groups bewail eviction of 34 families from military reservation

MANILA, Philippines — A peasant group on Wednesday accused the Philippine Army of evicting without any notice or warning 34 families inside the Fort Magsaysay Military Reservation (FMMR) in Nueva Ecija province. The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) and its local chapters Alyansa ng Magbubukid sa Gitnang Luzon (AMGL) and Alyansa ng Magbubukid na Nagkakaisa sa Fort Magsaysay 3,100 (Almana) claimed that the "families were treated like animals when the military tore down their houses quickly in just a day, without any form of warning or notice." Worse, an effort by representatives of the farmers to seek a dialogue with defense or military officials were ignored, said AMGL chairperson Joseph Canlas. "When they demolished the houses, we thought of having a dialogue with their office (DND) , but we were ignored as if we were a nonentity," he said in a press statement. The evicted families were occupying Lot 28 of barangay San Isidro in Laur town of Nueva Ecija. According to Canlas, the families have been residing at the fort since before the 1950s, but the government never distributed the lands. “Though, some had their Certificate of Land Ownership Award (Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program CLOAs) belonging to Agrarian Reform Communities (ARCs), the military settled and continued to harass the farmers, instilling them that they don't own the land," Canlas said. KMP secretary-general Danilo Ramos alleged that the situation in Fort Magsaysay was worse than in other places because the military themselves are the landlords. “Military officials are land grabbing and terrorizing peasants, slicing the 3,100 hectares like cake for themselves…," he said in the same press statement. Ramos said the demolition was made to pave the way for the implementation of Arroyo's “anti-peasant ‘super-regions’" in Central Luzon, which includes the Metro Luzon Urban Beltway, the Subic-Clark Tarlac Expressway, connecting the Nueva Ecija area, thus, causing massive displacement of hundreds of thousands of peasant households." Earlier reports said the land in question was part of the 3,100 hectares donated by the Department of National Defense to the DAR for victims of the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in 1991. Fort Magsaysay is home to the Army’s 7th Infantry Division. - D'Jay Lazaro, GMANews.TV