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Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Government to break up Hacienda Luisita (5:30 p.m.)
MANILA -- Workers at a plantation owned by the family of former President Corazon Aquino will receive land rather than shares in a milestone land reform decision, a senior government official said Wednesday.
The government in 1989 distributed shares to more than 4,000 households at the Hacienda Luisita, a 4,500-hectare sugar cane plantation owned by the Cojuangco clan -- to which Aquino belongs -- in northern Tarlac province.
But critics said the scheme only helped landowners prolong their hold on the land and didn't lift the laborers out of poverty.
The Presidential Agrarian Reform Council decided late Tuesday to terminate the stock distribution program in Luisita.
The government expects to distribute land titles to the households by the first quarter of next year after beneficiaries are identified, the property is valued and the owners are compensated, said Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser Pangandaman. (AP)
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