Defend Negros Island!

Negros is the sugarbowl of the Philippines as it is responsible for over half of all sugar production in the country. The sugar industry contributes about 90 million to the National GDP annually. Despite this, Farmworkers in the sugar fields of Negros make only 222 pesos or about 3.65 USD per day. They also work on a contract system called 'pakyawan,' where they work 12 hours of back-breaking work a day with no paid overtime. On top of these incredibly difficult working conditions, the farmwork in Negros crawls to a standstill annually during the Tiempo Muerto, or the dead season, where there is no harvest between the months of June to September.

The National Taskforce to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (or NTF-ELCAC) was first devised. It has since become the instrument of the government's repression and abuses against the Filipino people. From 2022 to 2025, there have been 52 Extrajudicial Killings and 4 cases of enforced disappearances perpetrated in Negros by state forces. These 19 killings only add to that amount. Additionally, there are 100 political prisoners incarcerated on the island.

Even before the scourge of the NTF-ELCAC, Negros has a long history of state violence,exacerbated by the Duterte era Memorandum Order 32 unleashing de facto martial law on the islands of Negros, Samar, and Bicol, which the government used as justification for its intensified deployments of the AFP and PNP to these regions.

We went to Negros and learned from the farmers and community organizers, the very victims of human rights abuses themselves, of their very desperate situation. With community journalist and researcher RJ Ledesma as our local guide, we heard accounts of how the military and police shot at and harassed farmers simply for growing food to eat and exercising their rights on their lawful land. We saw first-hand the intense militarization in the area and were subjected to state surveillance on more than one occasion.

We hold the righteous work of our courageous kasamas in contrast to the fascist US-backed Marcos regime. It is thìs administration and army that murdered RJ, Filipino-American activists Lyle Prijoles and Kai Sorem, and the other 16 lives that day in Toboso. Marcos and the fascist state forces and policies that continue to perpetuate violence in the countryside, killing farmers, peasant advocates, journalists, and students, violating time and time again International Humanitarian Law in the name of protecting the interests of Filipino bureaucrats. It is this very state violence and poverty that necessitates our integration with the people, to understand the conditions so that we can, together, create a better world for all Filipinos.