When a shower of gunfire rang across the vast Hacienda Luisita on November 16, 2004, blood spilled over the Cojuangco-owned sugar estate. Five years later, the culprits remain on the loose, ready to execute another killing spree.
The massacre in Luisita, which claimed the lives of seven striking agricultural workers, was a nightmare bound to happen with the sugar plantation heavily guarded with military and paramilitary forces. In fact, a few kilometers from Luisita is the Philippine Army’s Camp Aquino, which served as guardhouse of the Northern Luzon command, according to an article published by Bulatlat. Apparently, Luisita agri-workers, who are fighting against ridiculously low wages and union busting, have been held at gunpoint by the Cojuangcos since the start.
Luisita agri-workers did not give in despite the intensifying militarization. On Nov. 6, 2004, the 5,000-strong United Luisita Workers Union (ULWU, the sugarcane workers’ union) launched a strike at 11 a.m. over the illegal dismissal of its 326 members. The Central Azucarera de Tarlac Labor Union (CATLU, the sugar mill workers; union) also declared a strike at 3 p.m. on the same day after the sugar mill’s management turned down the P150-wage hike a proposal by the workers who take home only P9.50 a day, putting the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) into a deadlock. The simultaneous strikes “halted operations of the Hacienda Luisita Inc., the sugar plantation, and Central Azucarera de Tarlac, the hacienda’s sugar,” according to a Bulatlat article.
The strikers knew that at the root of their woes is the Stock Distribution Option (SDO) scheme being implemented by the Cojuangcos. Under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law signed by former Pres. Corazon “Cory” Aquino, who belongs to the family controlling the estate, tenants will be given stocks instead of getting what is due to them: land for the tillers and higher wages for farmworkers. With such understanding of how President Aquino used the law to keep Luisita immune to agrarian reform, the strikers from CATLU and ULWU forged an alliance which served as their sole weapon against armed units deployed in Luisita.
Luisita 5 