Arson foiled in Hacienda Luisita; strike now on 4th day

HACIENDA LUISITA, Tarlac — A group of still unidentified persons allegedly tried but failed to set on fire at dawn Sunday a portion of the 20-hectare Central Azucarera de Tarlac (CAT) complex, as about 700 workers in this Cojuangco-owned sugar estate entered the fourth day of their strike against supposed violations of the management in their collective bargaining agreement (CBA). However, other reports showed unidentified persons burned a portion of the materials recovery facility of the sugar milling factory.

No one was arrested in the incident, even as reports reaching the police have it that the arsonists pelted stones on firemen who put out the conflagration that nearly gutted Cat’s materials recovery facility, which is located at the eastern end of the sugar refinery.

According to Romeo Ecraela, Cat’s corporate affairs chief, "The strikers and their supporters are trying to create a situation of siege and anarchy." Despite the attack, he said that management is still finding ways on how to peacefully settle before the negotiating table the labor unrest being staged by the CAT Labor Union (CATLU).

It was on Friday night when CATLU members staged an industrial walkout to press management to give in to their demands, such as increasing their hospitalization benefits and stopping the downgrading of permanent positions to seasonal status. Ecraela said that the sugar firm, owned by the family of former President Corazon Aquino and her younger brother, presidential adviser on food security and jobs creation, former Tarlac Rep. Jose "Peping" Cojuangco Jr., stands to lose P15 million in "unrealized income" daily due to the strike. He added their milling target for this season is 900,000 tons of sugar cane, 30 percent of which would be from this 6,000-hectare sugar estate.

Because of the attempt to burn down some of Cat’s structures, combined police and military units have already secured the sugar milling complex.

According to reports the arsonists apparently entered the complex through irrigation canals here during the dead of the night.

As of Monday, all of the gates leading to the sugar central have, however, fallen under the control of the strikers, who have been reinforced by militant activists from the radical Kilusang Mayo Uno-Nagkakaisang Manggagawa ng Tarlac (KMU-NMT) and the left-leaning party-list group, Bayan Muna. As a result, trucks transporting sugar canes harvested from fields outside this Cojuangco-owned estate were prevented from entering the sugar central when the strike started last Friday night. Some of the protesters reportedly hijacked a fuel tanker, while others held a sugar delivery truck and its driver. Moreover, at least two spans of telephone lines here were reportedly cut off by the demonstrators.

Ecraela said management is maintaining a non-confrontational stand in the labor dispute.

Both the CAT management and CATLU were holding conciliatory talks early this month before the National Conciliation and Mediation Board (NCMB), but the talks collapsed over a heated debate involving the composition of the grievance committee. — With Ric Sapnu