The militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) lambasted anew Department of Labor and Employment Sec. Patricia Sto. Tomas for issuing the 5-day return to work order on the striking Central Azucarera de Tarlac Labor Union (CATLU). This order expires today. According to Danilo “Ka Daning” Ramos, secretary general of the group, “Sto. Tomas basically authorized another bloody dispersal in Hacienda Luisita and if anything happens to the farm workers blood will again be on her hands and the Cojuangco-Aquino clan,”

“By always saying that what she is doing is legal, she is washing her hands of the carnage her orders result into. Is it not obvious that not all that is legal is just? And the laws almost always favors the upper class,” added the peasant leader.

As for his part Carl Anthony Ala, public information officer of KMP, “now sources from Camp Olivas, are saying that there are aggregate forces of the Philippines National Police (PNP) and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) are being prepped in a desperate attempt to disperse the strikers under ULWU and CATLU. Here they are even breaking their own laws because the return to work order is for CATLU only. The clan of Corazon Cojuangco-Aquino is really hell-bent in depriving the strikers of their right to till the land and to have better living conditions,”

“For all its wealth the Corazon-Aquino clan still wants more at the expense of the farm workers and workers who were the ones responsible for this wealth in the first place,” ended Ala. # # #

KMP - 19 January 2005