KAKAMPI MO ANG BATAS.12 JULY 2011

KAKAMPI MO ANG BATAS.12 JULY 2011

“Luisita bought solely with Cojuangco money”

LIFE’S INSPIRATIONS: “Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”” Matthew 4:4

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“LUISITA BOUGHT SOLEY WITH COJUANGCO MONEY”-PEPING: Hacienta Luisita was purchased solely with the money of the Cojuangco family and their friends and business associates, and no money of the government was ever used by the Cojuangcos in buying it from its American owners then, former Tarlac Rep. Jose “Peping” Cojuangco Jr. clarified the other day.

Cojuangco, or Cong. Peping to his friends and allies, made the clarification in the aftermath of media releases urging his family to comply with its supposed obligation to distribute the Hacienda to its farm workers, allegedly because it was purchased using Central Bank loans and guarantees.

“Luisita was paid entirely with private funds without any financial dole from the government,” Cong. Peping explained, adding that “…the current aspersions still being cast at Luisita is the misleading insinuation that it was originally purchased with `inappropriate’ loan guarantees by the Central Bank.”

Cong. Peping said that the guarantee, in truth, pertained only to assurances to the foreign banks that foreign currency would not be withheld from Luisita in fulfilling its obligations, nothing more, nothing less.

“It is unfortunate that the issues continue to be obfuscated by the self-serving motives of third parties who do not have the true interests of the farmers at heart,” he rued.

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CLARIFICATIONS RE LUISITA ROW: Here are other important clarifications on the Hacienda Luisita issue made by the Tarlac lawmaker, who is an uncle of President Aquino: “The Cojuangco family has never, ever been against Land Reform.”

He explained that “at about the time Hacienda Luisita/Tabacalera was purchased by the Cojuangco family, it had subjected more than 6,000 hectares of its original 12,000-hectare holdings to farmers under the Land Tenure Act during President Magsaysay's administration…”

“Tragically,”, Cong. Peping said, “most of these farms no longer belong to the original recipients, because of the absence of a sustainable support system for the small farmers unversed in managing and marketing…”

This is the reason why, he said, many farm workers from the Hacienda, in at least two earlier but very recent referenda conducted by the Department of Agrarian Reform and by volunteer students from UP Diliman, actually chose the stock distribution option instead of land distribution.

Evidently, that is the system by which the interests of the farm workers would best be protected.

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