The National Democratic Front (NDF)-Negros firmly salutes the people and their organizations in Negros Island for the temporary suspension of operations of Consunji-owned HAPI’s (Hacienda Asia Plantations Incorporated) oil palm plantation in Candoni, Negros Occidental. Last June 11, a cease and desist order (CDO) was issued against the company for its failure to comply for an Environmental Compliance Certificate (ECC).
Due to the collective action of farmers, farm workers, and indigenous people alongside environmental and human rights groups since 2023, the 6,600 hectare-wide project spanning barangays Agboy, Pauayan, and Gatuslao that affects livelihoods and farmlots of over 100 farmers in the area, was halted. It can be recalled that the plantation bulldozed the land tilled by farmers and indigenous peoples in the area, while armed private goons and the 15th and 47th Infantry Battalion, all paid tools of the Consunji family, threatened the people to submit to HAPI’s desires. After prolonged silence, the local government was finally pressured into taking action due to consistent pressure from the people.
Albeit temporary, it is a victory against the imperialist neoliberal offensive in Negros Island. In recent years, the island has been plagued by sugar liberalization, reclamation projects, quarry and mining operations, commercial plantation projects, among others, that disrupt and destroy livelihoods of the Negrosanon masses. This goes to show that the organized masses can overcome the ruling class and their armed henchmen through ceaseless and tireless struggle.
Red fighters are also Green fighters, defenders of the land and the environment that imperialism actively destroys for profit. In the process, many Red fighters have sacrificed their lives to fight for the people against exploitation and oppression.
The armed struggle continues to persist hand-in-hand with the people’s genuine democratic struggles against foreign and local greed. While the economic aggression of big bourgeois compradors and landlords at the behest of imperialism continues, the NPA will as well, so does the support of the masses to them.
Moreover, the people should remain vigilant and continue to demand the total cessation of HAPI’s operations. By now, it is highly obvious that such corporations are in cahoots with rubber-stamp reactionary departments such as the Department of Environmental and Natural Resources (DENR) and the National Commission of Indigenous Peoples (NCIP), which both act as purveyors of permits in exchange for kickbacks. Legal prerequisites can be easily (and are historically) bought out and maneuvered towards their favor, especially with the involvement of the treacherous NTF-Elcac and AFP-PNP, who continue to harass and red-tag individuals and organizations.
NDF-Negros urges individuals and human rights groups, church people, environmental groups, non-government organizations and others to continue the demand to totally halt the oil palm plantation. Their resounding call must all the more be loudening. The masses must also continue to arouse, organize and mobilize their numbers to fight against environmental and economic plunder, human rights violations, and the neoliberal push not only in Candoni but the entire island.
The veneer of ‘development’ peddled by the US-Marcos II regime and its local sycophants in Negros can no longer fool the people who are the foremost victims of hunger, poverty and displacement amid the chronic socioeconomic crisis. Urban poor, peasant, and indigenous people communities who are being subjected to similar forms of exploitation should follow this experience to reject and resist the ongoing neoliberal attacks all over the island. Through this, our united front against imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat capitalism shall steadily advance.
