Karapatan Central Luzon strongly condemned the continuing harassment, intimidation, and repression by personnel of Terra Solar Philippines Inc. (TSPI) against peasants opposing the expansion of the Terra Solar Project being built in Gapan, Nueva Ecija.
Radyo Natin Guimba reported the company’s forcible land grabbing and destruction of crops and trees on April 22 in Sitio Sangilo, Barangay Macabaclay, Gapan City without seeking the farmers’ consent.
The Terra Solar Projects is a large-scale solar and battery energy storage facility that will cover 3,500 hectares of agricultural land in towns of Nueva Ecija and Bulacan. It is set to become the largest solar and battery facility in the world. TSPI is a subsidiary of SP New Energy Corporation controlled by Meralco PowerGen Corporation, the renewable energy arm of Manny Pangilinan’ Meralco. The project also involves United Kingdom-based company Actis that owns a 40% share in the project.
According to the group, the successive incidents of attacks, fence destruction, and the presence of the company’s private guards and police clearly show how power and violence are used to enforce the interests of big business.
“Renewable energy cannot be considered truly ecological and humane if it is based on land conversion, corporate land grabbing, and violent repression of communities… It only causes widespread conversion of agricultural land, destruction of local food production, and the displacement of farmers from their livelihoods,” the group explained.
It added the even more alarming is the project-related use of private goons and state armed agents to suppress public opposition. Militarization and intimidation are blatant violations of the people’s human rights and democratic rights to voice and fight for their land and livelihood.
It further said that instead of developing food production and supporting farmers, the US-Marcos regime prioritizes projects that seize fertile agricultural land for a “renewable energy transition,” which worsens the country’s food insecurity.
Karapatan Central Luzon urged the Commission on Human Rights to investigate the incidents of harassment against residents of Gapan and hold accountable all those involved in the intimidation and repression of the people.
