Luzon peasant groups vow protests vs Obama, APEC

By Chito A, Chavez

A militant group of farmers and their supporters said on Tuesday that their members from Southern Tagalog, Northern and Central Luzon are set to launch protest caravans and camp-outs against the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit and the visit of US President Barack Obama next week.

The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) announced that farmers will camp out at the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) in Quezon City starting November 18 and then march to Manila the following day.

Former Anakpawis Rep. Rafael Mariano, who is the current KMP chairman, vowed to defy the government’s “no permit, no rally” policy, saying farmers and other peasant groups “will assert our way to Manila.”

“We will assert our right to protest,” Mariano said. “Obama’s attendance to the Summit is a signal to APEC heads of state to harden their commitment to the bankrupt neoliberal economic policy by further removing all barriers to so-called free trade and the total eradication of support or subsidy and the dismantling of all tariff walls protecting Filipino peasants.”

He claimed that Obama will use the Summit as a vehicle to drag APEC-member nations to the anti-people Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA).

“The TPPA’s so-called investor-state dispute settlement system will not only remove legal barriers to trade but trample upon the sovereignty of countries by giving foreign investors and big businesses the right to take legal action against states whose policies are considered as a hindrance to their profit-taking,” Mariano said.

He maintained that the TPPA’s investor-state dispute settlement system is a “death warrant” to the country’s sovereignty.

Mariano added “the crisis of the capitalist system has led to the intensification of plunder of the world’s wealth and resources, including land, water, forests, and mineral resources, at the hands of the monopoly bourgeoisie, and their local agents.”