About 2,000 farmers yesterday began their four-day pilgrimage to Bacolod City to demand for the immediate extension of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program and to dramatize their determination to attain it, Task Force Mapalad-Negros chairman Jose Rodito Angeles said in a press release.

Negros peasants under TFM and the Negros CARP Reform Movement are warning solons here not to “frustrate their dreams” of having their own land under the government's land reform program, a TFM press statement said.

Vice Governor Isidro Zayco said it is the right of the caravan participants to air their demands but it should be done in a peaceful and orderly manner.

A comprehensive study by the provincial capitol has shown that the implementation of CARP in Negros Occidental has not been successful, Zayco said.

It is important that government provides support services so the recipients of the land can become productive to alleviate lives, Zayco said.

If we keep giving out lands without support services the CARP will not succeed, he said, so our legislators need to study the program well.

TFM said that at about 10 a.m., the southern contingent of their caravan, composed of farmers from Oriental Negros and southern and central parts of the province, took off from Kabankalan City, about 83 kilometers from Bacolod.

A program was held by the farmers in Himamaylan town and a signature campaign was launched to solicit support for the extension of CARP.

In Sagay City , around 500, most of them farmers, took off also around that time.

The press release said that two elderly women and one man fainted in the first nine kilometers. They were identified as Narciso Cañete, 48, of hacienda Rose Marie; Amparo Caontoy, 66, of of hacienda Minacalao; and Milagros Estrada, 54, of hacienda Caridad, the press release also said.

In the south, two farmers, Carmer Raydan, 52, and Elizabeth Bangit, also collapsed, the press release said.

“The heat is unbearable but this is nothing compared to our arduous struggle to own land,” Edwin Amores said.

Edna Sobrecaray, TFM-Negros spokesperson, said representatives Monico Puentevella of Bacolod City , Jeffrey Ferrer (Neg. Occ., 4 th District) and Ignacio Arroyo (Neg. Occ., 5 th district) should “see for themselves that the people in Negros are desirous to own land under the CARP. It would be a disservice to them if these three solons continue to delay its extension”.*

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