Bu-lat-lat (boo-lat-lat) verb: to search, probe, investigate, inquire; to unearth facts Volume IV, Number 5 February 29 - March 6, 2004 Quezon City, Philippines |
‘Thieves
Fighting Thieves’ Although
the monocrop sugar-based economy of Negros – an island in central Philippines
– appears not headed for collapse the industry is suffering from slump given
its inability to compete with sugar imports now flooding the domestic market.
And sugar planters are blaming technical smuggling – and Malacañang. By
Karl G. Ombion Sugar mill in La Carlota City, Negros Occidental Photo by Karl G. Ombion BACOLOD
CITY - Negros has long been economically stagnant because of the three-year
sugar crisis. But the way sugar planters and traders are trading barbs today the
whole island could yet bring itself near the proverbial “social volcano.” Although
the monocrop sugar-based economy of Negros – an island in central Philippines
– appears not headed for collapse the industry is suffering from slump given
its inability to compete with sugar imports now flooding the domestic market.
And sugar planters are blaming technical smuggling – and Malacañang. Leaders
of militant farmers groups in Negros and the underground armed movement offer a
different view. To them the current sugar crisis is the result of squabbles
among sugar planters, millers and traders and Malacañang should also be held to
account. Since
the start of the milling season, the mill gate price of raw sugar has steadily
dropped from P845-P870 a bag to its current P634. Alarmed
by the continued lowering of sugar prices, sugar planters from the United Sugar
Producers’ Federation of the Philippines (Unifed) held a protest march two
weeks ago from the Capitol Lagoon to the public plaza in this city. Led by
Manuel Lamata and backed by a contingent of farm workers, the protesters asked
Malacañang – the presidential office – to stop the smuggling of sugar that
they said is causing a glut and is bringing down sugar prices for months now. Lamata
said that sugar is being smuggled in from Thailand and Australia in container
vans. He revealed that at least 150,000 bags of sugar have been brought into the
country illegally and are unloaded mostly in Cebu and Manila. Known
to government The
outspoken sugar planter told Bulatlat.com that smuggling through the
country’s ports is going on under the nose of government authorities.
Smugglers buy cheap sugar from abroad, and make a net profit of P50-100 for
every 1 kg of sugar brought in. They give away P50 per 1 kg as bribe, he also
said. The
amount of smuggled sugar does not include huge loads of pre-mix sugar
concentrates or flavored juices that are brought into the country by traders who
are close, he said, to Malacañang. Now the favorite of big industrial and
commercial users because of its cheap price, premix sugar is only slapped with 3
percent tariff compared to 65 percent for imported raw sugar. The
sugar planters also point to technical smuggling of pre-mix sugar as among the
causes of the glut or oversupply that drives the prices of sugar down. Pre-mix
sugar is being unloaded from container vans, causing an oversupply and in the
process, pressing sugar prices down. This is causing financial blight to
planters and millers, Lamata warned. Given
the big volume of smuggled sugar, sugar produced in the various sugar mills in
the province is hardly moving, a source from the Sugar Regulatory Administration
(SRA) told Bulatlat.com. Warehouses of sugar mills are always filled up
while other millers are renting out bodegas where sugar that is not brought to
market is stocked, the source added. Pressed
to explain reports of smuggling, SRA Administrator James Ledesma said that while
government continues to ship out sugar to the United States and other foreign
markets, the volume of sugar coming in is just too big to stop the prices of
sugar from plummeting. Admits
smuggling Ledesma
also confirmed fears that the sugar price could slide to P500 a bag. “The
worst could yet happen,” he warned. He admitted that sugar smuggling exists. In
recent media interviews, however, Negros Occidental Governor Joseph Marañon
called for the resignation of Ledesma. If Ledesma cannot solve the sugar crisis,
the governor said, he should leave his post. Marañon
also warned that if key industry players and Malacañang failed to stop sugar
prices from sliding, thousands of sugar farm workers would join the revolution,
reminiscent of the 1970s when the sugar crisis fueled the armed revolutionary
struggle waged by the New People’s Army (NPA). Earlier,
in a strongly-worded statement published in local dailies, Arsenio Acuña,
Negros del Norte Sugar Planters’ Association president, said bigwigs in the
sugar industry including millers, heads of planters’ groups and traders were
involved in the smuggling scam. Those found guilty of sugar smuggling should be
lynched, he said. Former
Sugar Regulatory Administrator Wilson Gamboa also warned of the blight and
blamed the powers-that-be for the crisis. He also shot down a proposal by former
Negros Occidental Gov. Daniel Lacson, Jr. for a sugar-buying scheme saying
government has no money due to deficit-spending. Gamboa
called for the resignation of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo whom he said is
responsible for nurturing the climate favorable for sugar smuggling.
Police
Senior Supt. Carlos Holganza, chief of the Anti-Smuggling Task Force, himself
confirmed that sugar smuggling has grown so rampant it has become unstoppable
and is causing a glut in the market. But he dismissed insinuations that
Macapagal-Arroyo’s husband, Mike Arroyo, and his brother Ignacio Arroyo are
also to blame for the sugar smuggling. Battle
of thieves Meanwhile,
the sugar industry crisis has been likened to a case of “thieves robbing
thieves.” In clarifying this point, John Milton Lozande, secretary general of
the National Federation of Sugar Workers (NFSW) told Bulatlat.com that
this is not the first time the sugar planters, millers and the traders favored
by Malacañang, and those not, are locked in a fierce fight over prices of sugar
and sugar policies. “The
so-called crisis is caused by squabbles, deceptions and maneuvers between big
millers-traders and planters,” Lozande said. “The planters are accusing the
millers-traders of manipulating the sugar prices and engineering the smuggling
of imported sugar and pre-mix sugar concentrates that cause over supply and
consequent drop in the mill-gate prices of sugar. A group of traders identified
with the Malacañang bureaucrats are monopolizing the sugar importation and
market pricing causing marginalization of smaller traders.” Bulatlat.com
research reveals that during the dictatorship in the 1970s-1980s, President
Ferdinand Marcos and his cronies led by former Ambassador Roberto Benedicto
virtually lorded over the sugar industry and raked in billions of profits from
production, financing, marketing and trading – all under the auspices of
Malacañang-controlled National Sugar Trading Administration (Nasutra) and the
Philippine Sugar Commission (Philsucom). Under
the Estrada presidency, a group of traders and exporter-importers cornered the
marketing-trading, export-import, and pricing of sugar in the whole country.
There were reports of Malacañang control and manipulation of sugar market and
trading, as well as massive sugar smuggling by traders identified with alleged
Estrada cronies. Controversial
was a special executive order of President Estrada authorizing his office to
control all imported sugar, including the reclassification of all imported sugar
that in turn chalked in billions in new taxes. Liberalization
and deregulation Lozande
said all these were made possible under the government’s policies of
liberalization and deregulation. He also said that when Macapagal-Arroyo became
president she placed key players in the industry under her influence and
mobilized her favored traders to control the sugar trading and marketing. She
then revamped the SRA and picked as its head a pro-government planter, Ledesma. Local
media and planters also alleged that Malacañang mobilized big
traders/exporter-importers led by Lucio Co of Pure Golds Industries, which
reportedly became the sole importer of all duty-free shops in Subic and Manila
and as sole importer of Thailand sugar, among others. Co is the person whom
Unifed leader Lamata had told local media was caught in Cebu for allegedly
carrying five vans containing thousands of tons of smuggled sugar. The
President, Lozande also said, has allowed the massive importation of sugar
especially from Thailand, Mexico and Australia resulting in the flooding of the
local market with cheap sugar. Technical smuggling became rampant involving the
illegal entry of cheaper imported sugar ($11-15 cents per pound) from world
market, and the reclassification of this to sugar A for export to the lucrative
U.S. market ($21-24 cents per pound, o P980 per bag). “Naging
malaganap ang maniobrahan at lansihan sa loob ng industriya ng asukal”
(Maneuvers and deceptions became the order of the day),” Lozande said. Similarly,
Fr. Frank Fernandez, Negros revolutionary leader, laid the blame for the present
sugar crisis on the doorstep of Malacañang and a faction of the sugar
planters-traders under its wing composed of Mike Arroyo and presidential
brother-in-law Ignacio Arroyo. “Big
sugar traders, millers and several officials of the Sugar Regulatory
Administration (SRA), sugar planters association and Malacañang bureaucrats are
part of the group,” said Fernandez, believed to be the head of the National
Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) in Negros. Not
local planters but the “sugar industry mafia” is raking in millions of money
from sugar transactions, from government funds for the rehabilitation of the
sugar industry and sugar smuggling operations taking place within a
crisis-ridden sugar industry hit hard by the government’s adherence to the
policy of liberalization, deregulation and privatization, Fernandez also said. Fernandez said that the NDFP is willing to build links of “friendship and alliance with individuals, groups and forces in the sugar industry” to wage a common struggle against the pro-imperialist and anti-people policies of President Macapagal-Arroyo. Bulatlat.com We want to know what you think of this article.
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