KARAPATAN denounced the recent arrests and harassment of peasants in Hacienda Almeda in Occidental Mindoro and in Hacienda Luisita in Tarlac City.

At least 31 Iraya Mangyan residents, including 16 elderly individuals and 15 minors, were reported to have been illegally arrested and detained by seven private goons and four members of the Police Regional Mobile Group in Hacienda Almeda, Abra de Ilog, Occidental Mindoro on October 18, 2024. As of this writing, reports reached the human rights group that the 31 are facing charges of trespassing and malicious mischief.

According to the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas, Hacienda Alameda covers 1,546 hectares of land in Mamburao and Abra de Ilog, which were placed under agrarian reform coverage in 1988 under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP). In 1992, the Department of Agrarian Reform ordered the inclusion of the Almeda family’s landholdings under CARP, and Certificates of Land Ownership Award (CLOAs) were issued to 58 farmer-beneficiaries including the Iraya Mangyan tribe. At least 31 hectares of the said land are considered ancestral domains of the tribe.

The indigenous peasants have persistently asserted their claims to the land which they have tilled for decades, despite numerous attacks against them. In 2017, around 100 policemen and private guards demolished 20 makeshift homes of indigenous peoples in the area.

At around 9 p.m. of October 19, 2024, four armed men in plain clothes believed to be from the 3rd Mechanized Infantry Battalion of the Philippine Army entered the compound of Francisco Dizon, chair of Alyansa ng Magbubukid sa Asyenda Luisita (AMBALA), in Barangay Mapalacsiao, Tarlac City, and tried to force him to go with them. Dizon’s staunch refusal to go with the men, whose faces were masked, as well as the intervention of other AMBALA officers and barangay officials averted what would have been Dizon’s abduction or illegal arrest.

Meanwhile, elements of Philippine National Police-Tarlac and the 31st Mechanized Infantry Company of the 3rd Mechanized Infantry Battalion blocked one of several vans carrying peasants from Hacienda Luisita who were on the way to a rally commemorating National Peasant Month. Soldiers have also been going house to house and surveilling other leaders of AMBALA to intimidate them from joining the scheduled protest actions.

AMBALA is recognized by the Supreme Court as the only legitimate organization representing the interests and welfare of the agricultural workers and peasants of Hacienda Luisita.

The hacienda, a 6,453-hectare sugar plantation spanning 11 barangays in three towns of Tarlac, is owned by the Cojuangco family., The Cojuangcos have, for decades, resorted to various legal maneuvers such as the bogus stock distribution option scheme to prevent the distribution of the hacienda land to the tenants and workers.

On November 16, 2004, the sugar estate was the site of the Hacienda Luisita Massacre where seven persons were killed, 121 people, including children, were injured and 133 arrested and detained after soldiers and paramilitaries violently dispersed some 1,000 striking workers of Central Azucarera de Tarlac Labor Union and the United Luisita Workers Union.