Luisita

There is a war of mutually assured destruction going on.

While the Liberals at the Senate are busy wringing every drop of political juice possible from the C-5 controversy in order to take down Manny Villar, the Nacionalistas are frantically researching on Hacienda Luisita’s affairs for dirt that may be used to take down Nonoy Aquino.

Both cases are vulnerable to charges that political influence was used to create private wealth. That is not difficult to imagine: it is the abiding story of the oligarchy in this country.

Who was it who said that behind every great wealth is a great crime?

We know now from the information sheets being handed out by the partisans that Hacienda Luisita was acquired by Don Jose “Pepe” Cojuangco in 1957 by means of a loan from the GSIS and another dollar-denominated loan from a New York-based bank that was guaranteed by the Philippine government.

That alone is odd. Why would the pension fund of public sector workers finance the acquisition of a plantation by private parties? And why would the Philippine government guarantee a private loan?

Well, in those days, our governance was a little wild and wooly. People with power basically got their way.

But it was not absolutely wild and wooly. When the Monetary Board agreed to provide government guarantee for the Luisita loan, a proviso was inserted into the documents committing Hacienda Luisita to redistribute land to the farmers ten years after the plantation was purchased. That insertion was made, I suppose, to provide a public purpose to cover the grant of a public guarantee.

The 10th year of Hacienda Luisita came in 1967. No land was transferred.

Dona Metring Cojuangco, Cory’s mom and Noynoy’s grandmother, claimed that there were no tenants on the land. Therefore, the proviso imposed by the Monetary Board was moot.

We know, of course, that there were tenants on the land owned by Hacienda Luisita and administered for a time by an in-law named Benigno S. Aquino Jr. In the sixties, some of these tenants like Bernabe Buscayno joined the Huks and then the NPA. Some of those tenants were shot a few years ago when the Hacienda’s vice-president for security was Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III.

Because there were tenants on the land, a special provision was built into the agrarian reform program of then President Corazon Cojuangco Aquino. That special provision allowed Hacienda Luisita to distribute shares of stock in the corporation instead of land to the tenants. When angry farmers marched on the Palace, a massacre infamously occurred at Mendiola.

Today, the price of land in sprawling Hacienda Luisita has been greatly enhanced by the fact that the SCTEX, our truly world-class tollway, has an interchange that links up with the hacienda’s roadway. The withering industrial estate built within the hacienda has been given new life.

Inasmuch as Manny Villar’s properties gained in value because the C-5 extension ran through them, the land values at Hacienda Luisita appreciated because the SCTEX connects to them. In both cases, where the road passes and where it ends could be the results of the exercise of political influence.

There might be some merit in having an interchange at Luisita. It is, after all, an industrial estate in the making. There might not be much in there right now, but with the interchange it could blossom.

That does not please Boying Remulla of the Nacionalista Party, however. He led a congressional inquiry into the matter but was barred from conducting an ocular inspection of the project.

Remulla claims that the SCTEX grossly overpaid Luisita for right of way. The P80 million paid Luisita priced the land at roughly P100 per square meter when the selling price of agricultural land in the vicinity was only between P6 to P8 per square meter.

The windfall from the sale of right of way to the SCTEX did not benefit the farmers-shareholders who owned a third of Luisita stock. Instead of being given a third of the money gained from the sale, they were only awarded a pittance in the form of dividends.

 In addition, says Remulla, government spent not only for the interchange but also for the roadwork that connected to Luisita’s road system. At the SLEX, he says, Asia Brewery, Greefields and Southwoods paid government to have interchanges for their properties. The fact that government paid so much for the land and then paid for the costs of the interchange partly accounts for the cost of the SCTEX jumping from the original 1999 estimate of P18.7 billion to the final price tag of P32.808 billion.

 Noynoy’s defenders say that his stake in Hacienda Luisita Inc. is only a negligible fraction. That may be true. But Remulla insists that Noynoy used all his influence as a legislator to ensure that there was an interchange at Luisita and the right of way was properly compensated for. With the interchange, the price of Luisita land is bound to rise substantially over the next few years, fattening up every single share of the corporation.

Remulla’s point seems to be that the wrongdoing Villar is accused of should also be pinned on Noynoy. If Villar’s presidential ambition is torpedoed because of the C-5 controversy, the Nacionalistas seem bent on torpedoing Noynoy’s candidacy as well.

Let them play this game of mutually assured destruction. Our voters, after all, have other options in this electoral round.