Bill bars use of military in labor, land disputes

LEFTIST lawmakers will today file a bill prohibiting the assignment of military or para-military forces to law-enforcement duties in areas under labor or agrarian dispute to avoid a repeat of the 2004 massacre in Hacienda Luisita, the sprawling plantation owned by the family of President Benigno Aquino III.

Twelve picketing farmers and two children were killed and hundreds were injured in the Nov. 16, 2004 incident after police and soldiers dispatched by then Labor secretary Patricia Santo Tomas, on behalf of the Cojuangco family, stormed a blockade by plantation workers who were demanding fairer wages and more benefits.

House Bill 5374 by Bayan Muna Reps. Teddy Casiño and Neri Colmenares, Anakpawis Rep. Rafael Mariano, and Gabriela Reps. Emmi de Jesus and Luz Ilagan would ban the deployment of any military unit in areas with impending or ongoing labor or agrarian disputes like Hacienda Luisita.

The measure comes after the Supreme Court ordered 4,915 hectares of Hacienda Luisita distributed to farmers under the land reform program.

The leftist lawmakers say the deployment of troops in areas with labor and agrarian disputes often lead to a violation of workers’ and peasants’ rights.

“Workers and peasants, often in the midst of a collective bargaining or negotiation or a dispute, have been either killed, abducted, tortured or harassed,” the bill says.

“Soldiers are not trained and equipped to take on law enforcement duties and functions, which is the domain of the regular police force. In fact, owing to their military training and orientation, these military personnel consider the striking workers and peasants as their ‘enemies’ who must be suppressed or crushed.”

The bill says only the President may order the deployment of troops to an area under dispute if violence threatens to break out or has broken out and there is an urgent need to quell it. –Maricel Cruz, Manila Standard Today