The Federation of Free Farmers (FFF) has urged President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos to reaffirm his administration’s commitment to fully implement the Constitutional mandate to “apply the principles of agrarian reform in public lands” and to “undertake the just distribution of all agricultural lands” in the disposition of government-held or owned lands.

In a statement, FFF chairman Leonardo Montemayor said some government agencies seem to be flouting the clear provisions of Executive Order No. 75 issued by President Duterte in 2019.

The EO requires all unclassified public lands and government-owned lands held by government instrumentalities — that are suitable for agriculture or no longer needed to achieve their original purpose — should be turned over to the Department of Agrarian Reform and distributed to qualified beneficiaries.

The peasant group’s appeal was aired amidst plans by the Departments of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), National Defense (DND), and Justice (DOJ) to lease large areas under their jurisdiction in favor of big corporations.

Montemayor cited the DENR’s recent announcement to offer – on a competitive bidding basis – a million hectares of denuded forests to private sector interests seeking to restore these lands as investments and for “carbon credits”.

He added that tens of thousands of hectares within government reservations are being tapped by agencies like the Philippine Army and the DOJ’s Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) – in collaboration with the business sector — for conversion into large-scale plantations and other projects.

“Take the case of the 46,000-hectare Kibaritan Military Reservation covering several municipalities in Bukidnon and Lanao del Sur. The Mindanao Army Training Group (MATG) in Camp Kibaritan, Kalilangan, Bukidnon is forcibly removing Higaonon indigenous and Christian farmers from their 195-hectare farm area that are devoted to food crops. Many of them had been there before the reservation was proclaimed in 1963,” Montemayor disclosed.

The MATG’s Facebook post last March 23, 2023 reported that the Philippine Army is considering — together with investors – to transform the farmers’ occupations into a “hybrid banana plantation” for “food security” purposes.

Meanwhile, the BuCor and the Philippine Export Zone Authority have publicized plans to carve out at least 26,000 hectares out of the 38,000-hectare Iwahig Penal Colony in Palawan for a mega-economic and manufacturing enclave.

Photo: Federation of Free Farmers FB