FARMER-beneficiaries from Hacienda Aqueda in Barangay Odiong, Moises Padilla slammed the local police allegedly for “neglecting” their duty and for allowing farm workers to drive them away from the land awarded to them by the Department of Agrarian Reform.

The farmer-beneficiaries were loyal employees of Rosita Montañes, former owner of the 64-hectare farm lots which DAR had awarded them.

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The said farm lot was a portion of the 94-hectare property of Montañes, which was formally awarded to some 50 farmer-beneficiaries during an installation ceremony last Sept. 25 by DAR, according to Task Force Mapalad.

Romeo Parnicio, president of Hacienda Agueda Agrarian Reform Beneficiaries Organization, said policemen from the community-based police assistance center (Compac), located just 150 meters from the hacienda, “simply watched as some dozen landowner’s men, led by the encargado (overseer) Eddie Balanggaan, entered the property with a tractor and eight security guards.”

The security guards threw stones at the farmer-beneficiaries while some security guards fired shots into the air, Parnicio said.

Parnicio said the farmer-beneficiaries were cleaning a two-hectare portion of the lot where sugarcane had just been harvested and were preparing the land for cultivation when the incident occurred last November 6.

He said a certain PO1 Villaflor tried to intervene and asked the intruders to stop, but still Balanggaan gave an order for the tractor to proceed with harrowing the land.

“The police could have made an arrest right then and there, but when Balangaan’s men started throwing stones and the security guards fired shots, the policemen simply stood aside and watched the incident,” said Parnicio, adding that two of their companions, Jocelyn Ortega and Enrique Manilog, were hit by stones and suffered injuries.

Parnicio said he immediately reported the incident to the municipal police station, where they were told by a policeman that to avoid further injury, they should withdraw from the area and just file complaints in court.

Parnicio urged Moises Padilla police chief Gil Flores and Negros Occidental police chief Manuel Felix, to send policemen to clear their property of Balanggaan’s men.

Three days later, Montañez’s men barricaded the entrance to the property, set up a bamboo gate, and removed the “DAR-acquired property” signboard near the gate, said Parnicio.

In subsequent days, Montañez men constructed a nipa hut near the famer-beneficiaries’ areas and a tractor was deployed to harrow the awarded property, Parnicio said.

TFM president Jose Rodito Angeles said the DAR national office should intervene and make a decisive move to prevent Montañez from doing more harm to the farmer-beneficiaries.

“Rosita Montañez had mocked DAR’s authority by occupying the property already owned by the farmer-beneficiaries. Unless the DAR national office do something, the situation in Hacienda Agueda could get worse,” said Angeles.

Montañez could not be reach for comment on the issue as of this posting Tuesday.