The conflict between two rival groups of agrarian reform beneficiaries yesterday turned from bad to worse as they figured in a gunbattle, which led to the injury of four, in Hacienda Malaga-Velez, Brgy. Robles, La Castellana.

The four injured were identified as Enrique Maliksi, chief security officer of the hacienda, Renato Mata - a farm worker and Fernando Santillan and Rey Cortejo, members of the Task Force Mapalad.

Senior Inspector Placido Composa, La Castellana police chief, yesterday said the two rival groups accused each other of starting the gunbattle.

Eight empty shells from a shotgun were initially recovered by the police from the gunbattle scene. Maliksi and Mata yesterday were being treated for gunshot wounds at the Corazon Locsin Montelibano Memorial Regional Hospital in Bacolod City.

Composa said the incident erupted after TFM members occupied a portion of the hacienda, which they claimed had already been awarded to them by the Department of Agrarian Reform.

TFM, in a statement, yesterday condemned the shooting, which it described as "another infringement of the rights of the CLOA holders to take actual possession of their land".

"It is unfortunate that the only people who fight each other and get hurt are the poor, just because one landowner is hard headed and one government official is weak, indecisive and irresponsible," TFM spokesperson Edna Sobrecaray, said.

Initial police investigations showed that the four victims suffered minor gunshot wounds in different parts of their bodies.

Sobrecaray claimed the shooting started as security guards backed by a squad of police-supervised Civilian Volunteer Organization men, tried to disperse some 100 agrarian reform beneficiaries who tried to occupy a portion of the 144-hectare land awarded to them in 2002.

Composa said hacienda guards called the attention of TFM members who occupied the property they are claiming, which later led to a commotion and exchange of fire, between the two groups.

Those who engaged in the gunbattle were nowhere to be found when policemen and soldiers of the 11th Infantry Battalion arrived, he said.

Troopers of the 603rd Provincial Mobile Group have been tasked by Senior Supt. Rosendo Franco, provincial police director, to secure the hacienda.

TFM members earlier slammed Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser Pangandaman for his failure to fulfill his promise to install them in the hacienda, which had been postponed four times already.*GPB

back to top