HACIENDA LUISITA — The respective presidents of the two labor
unions here that continue to lockup Luzon’s biggest sugar mill
maintained that there were “snipers” during the Nov. 16
dispersal that several people dead and more than a hundred others
injured due to gunshot wounds.
This, even as Ricardo Ramos and Rene Galang,
respective presidents of the Central Azucarera de Tarlac Labor
Union (CATLU) and the United Luisita Workers’ Union (ULWU), have
expressed fears that the “baseless conjectures” by Executive
Secretary Eduardo Ermita and the police probe panel that there
were communist rebels among the rallyists and that the first
bursts of gunfire came from the demonstrators during the incident
may lead to another violent attack on their picketline here.
Ramos noted that, up to now, the police-led
“Task Force Luisita,” which Director General Edgardo Aglipay
created to investigate the incident, has been ignoring accounts
that snipers shot at the rallyists.
This same allegation was earlier confirmed by
Lt. Col. Preme Monta, spokesman for the Armed Forces’ Northern
Luzon Command (Nolcom).
Monta, who said he was positioned beside the
ambulances at the rear of the anti-riot force that was surging
forward to dismantle the picketline at the CAT refinery’s Gate
1, then said over a telephone interview that he saw “gunfire
flashes” coming from at least four trucks loaded with sugarcane
that were parked nearby.
When one of the two V-150 armored personnel
carriers rushed to the trucks, Monta said he saw several men
suddenly scamper away, even as recovered from there were an M-16
rifle, a carbine and a cal. 38 pistol.
But Galang said that when the police presented
the supposedly recovered firearms before the media, he noted that
the authorities were insinuating that these were taken from the
rallyists’ positions.
Already, “Task Force Luisita” head, Deputy
Director General Reynaldo Velasco, has claimed that one of those
slain during the dispersal, 20-year-old Jhaivie Basilio, of
Barangay Mapalacsiao here, was included in the police “order of
battle” for allegedly being a New People’s Army (NPA) rebel.
But Ramos, who is the concurrent village chief
of Barangay Mapalacsiao, belied this, saying that the victim was a
“common youngster.”
Both union leaders also confirmed Monta’s
observation about the gunfires coming from the nearby parked
trucks, but they added there were also shots being fired from the
top of the sugar mill’s reservoir, “and from the soldiers near
the entrance of Gate 1.”
Galang observed that it was unlikely for NPA
rebels to take firing positions at the trucks, as he pointed out
that the area was then already under the control of the anti-riot
force, and that the location of the reservoir was from where some
soldiers and policemen emerged when the picketline was already
dismantled.
It was around 3 p.m. when the dispersal
operation commenced, with the anti-riot contingent pounding the
rallyists with tear gas canisters and water cannons.
Galang said that video footages by ABS-CBN,
whose cameraman, Paul Viray, was hit by a rock coming from the
policemen’s position, showed that the strikers only used stones,
slingshots and Molotov cocktail bombs in fighting back.
It was after about 40 minutes, when government
elements thrice failed to drive away the rallyists, when a volley
of bullets rained on the picketline, both union leaders said.
Galang said that the gunfires lasted for about
10 minutes.
“Witnesses saw soldiers and policemen going
after and shooting protesters into the cane fields,” said Ramos.
He added that they have learned from some
staffers of the St. Martin de Porres Hospital here that soldiers
“placed guns” beside the bodies of three protesters who
succumbed to gunshot wounds.
According to Ramos, claims by the Cojuangco
family and government authorities that the firing started from the
ranks of the rallyists and that they were infiltrated by rebel
elements are “likely meant to deceive the public and escape from
criminal accountability.”
“Not a single witness or video shot has been
presented to prove that anybody aside from the soldiers and the
police were armed during the massacre,” added Ramos.
MISSING BODIES?
Meanwhile, concern has been raised by human
rights advocates over the purported missing bodies of seven other
victims of the dispersal. By accounts of both the group Karapatan
and mediamen in the province, at least 14 people, including two
infants, were said to have died in the incident.
So far, only seven slain protesters whose
bodies were recovered by their relatives have been identified.
They were Jhaivie Basilio of Barangay Mapalacsiao; Adriano
Caballero, Jessie Valdez and Juancho Sanchez, all of Barangay
Balete.
Jesus Lasa, Barangay Parang; John David,
Barangay Cutcut 2nd, and Jaime Pastidio, Barangay Motrico.
All of the said villages are among the 10
barangays covered by this sprawling plantation in Tarlac City, and
the towns of Concepcion and La Paz.
The others who also reportedly died due to
gunshot wounds were one Boy Versola, a Neng Manalo and another man
surnamed Sosa.
Two other victims were said to be from the
Visayas who worked as seasonal “sacadas” (sugarcane
cutters) here, one of whom was the father of one of the two
infants who died of asphyxiation due to tear gas.
According to Galang, seasonal sacadas
here mostly come from the Visayas and Mindanao. They are not
members of the ULWU, which represents the more than 5,000 land
reform beneficiaries here under the stock distribution scheme of
the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).
The exact number of sacadas here could
not be determined, but they can be found living in makeshift
shanties near the refinery in barangays Central and Mapalacsiao.
Notably, of the exactly 111 people whom the
police rounded up and detained at Camp Gen. Francisco Makabulos
after the dispersal, majority of them were found to be of Visayan
origin, while the others were “pahinantes,” or drivers
of the trucks of sugarcane planters from elsewhere in Central and
Northern Luzon who have been bringing their harvests here for this
year’s milling season.
According to Galang, when the picketline was
then taken over by the police and soldiers, the main bulk of the
protesters retreated to Barangay Balete, leaving elements of the
anti-riot force rounding up mostly the sacadas and truck
drivers who were then merely watching the clash from a distance.
Meanwhile, protest leaders here and the victims’
relatives have decided on Friday night to simultaneously bury the
seven victims on Tuesday, as they will then mark the first week of
what they now call the “Hacienda Luisita Massacre.”