Luisita guards hurt in clash with workers

HACIENDA LUISITA, Tarlac – A number of security guards in this Cojuangco-owned, 6,000-hectare sugar estate were reportedly hurt in a clash with protesting farm workers yesterday.

The Hacienda Luisita Inc. (HLI) management threatened to file charges against the workers who, however, claimed that the guards were the ones who provoked the skirmish.

The incident further heightened the tension at this sugar estate. The protesting farm-workers were enraged when the HLI management, in a statement to a local tabloid, described their demands as "unrealistic" and "unreasonable."

It has been three weeks now since farm workers from the 10 barangays covered by this vast sugar plantation have been staging demonstrations to protest the cutback on their working days. The estate has 5,228 workers.

Under their collective bargaining agreement with the management, the hacienda workers are guaranteed 423,393 working man-days per year.

However, the HLI has enforced a new policy wherein each farm worker is only allowed to work for an average of three hours per week, or at least two days a month.

Every farm worker here is paid P194.50 for every eight hours of work. With the reduced working man-days, protest leaders said each of them will now be earning only P73 a week, or at least P291.75 per month.

Supporting the farm workers’ protest is the biggest labor group here, the Central Azucarera de Tarlac Labor Union, and the left-leaning Alyansa ng mga Magbubukid sa Tarlac, provincial affiliate of the militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas.