Luisita labor leader killed in Tarlac

Unidentified gunmen killed early Friday morning another labor leader at the Hacienda Luisita in Tarlac, as the victim was on his way home from a Lenten ritual. Tirso Cruz, director of United Luisita Workers Union (ULWU), is the third labor leader killed in Tarlac since January this year, and the 18th in the whole of Central Luzon. Activist group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) condemned the killing of Cruz. Investigators are still looking into the motive of the killing. Initial reports said around 12:30 A.M. Friday, Cruz was walking home from a pabasa (a reading of the Passion of Christ) when unidentified assailants ambushed him in Pando, Concepcion, Tarlac. Cruz is also a village councilman in Pando. ULWU is one of two workers’ unions in the 6,000-hectare sugar plantation owned by the Cojuangcos, the family of former president Corazon Aquino. The other is the Central Azucarera de Tarlac Labor Union (Catlu), whose 45-year old president Ricardo Ramos was also killed October last year. The two groups led the workers’ strike in 2005 to protest the stock distribution scheme and decrease in farm workers’ pay in Hacienda Luisita. The protest action ended violently after soldiers dispersed the strikers, resulting in the death of seven workers. Shots were also allegedly fired from the strikers’ rank. The Commission of Human Rights vowed to investigate the incident. The Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), after the incident, ordered the distribution of Hacienda Luisita lands to 5,000 farmer-beneficiaries under the Agrarian Reform Law. DAR secretary Nasser Pangandaman approved the issuance of notice of coverage following the decision of the Presidential Agrarian Reform Council to revoke the sugar plantation’s stock distribution plan. The Stock Distribution Option (SDO) was signed and implemented in 1987, a year before the Agrarian Reform Law was passed under Aquino’s term. Pangandaman said then the plantation’s owners could still appeal the decision before the Supreme Court and assured the Cojuangcos of fair compensation.-GMANews.TV