Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser Pangandaman.*

Agrarian Reform Secretary Nasser Pangandaman yesterday said he was saddened by the death of a farmer beneficiary in Hacienda Velez-Malaga in Barangay Robles, La Castellana, but blamed the violence that erupted on Task Force Mapalad for the "self installation" of farmers.

TFM, on the other hand, blamed Pangandaman for the violence that erupted that caused the death of Pepito Santillan yesterday morning.

We blame Pangandaman for this, his weakness, indecisiveness and failure to fulfill his promise to install CLOA holders led to this incident, TFM spokesperson Edna Sobrecanay said.

For killing of one more
farmer-beneficiary
BY GILBERT BAYORAN

A Task Force Mapalad member, Pepito Santillan, 60, died yesterday after being shot by unidentified armed men in La Castellana, Negros Occidental.

A day earlier his colleagues allegedly engaged in a gunbattle with security guards of Hacienda Malaga-Velez in Brgy. Robles, La Castellana, where four persons, including a farm worker of landowner Roberto Cuenca, were injured. Santillan was the sixth TFM leader killed in Negros Occidental since 2004, whose deaths were linked to the implementation of agrarian reform programs in the province, police said.

Initial police investigations showed that Santillan was shot in front of his residence in the hacienda at about 2 a.m. yesterday, allegedly by a group of persons identifying themselves as military men, witness claimed.

Drilon: Police exoneration in
Capitol siege 'whitewash'
BY CARLA GOMEZ

Senator Franklin Drilon.*

Senator Franklin Drilon yesterday insisted that there was excessive use of force in the police siege on the Iloilo Capitol on Jan. 17 and that the police exoneration of those involved was "very obviously a whitewash."

Drilon, who spoke to the DAILY STAR after a Senate hearing on the Iloilo siege, said Chief Supt. Wilfredo Dulay, Region 6 police director, admitted himself that there was excessive use of force when the police entered the Iloilo Capitol to serve a dismissal order on Gov. Niel Tupas.

But in the same hearing Dulay also said he had recommended that the cops involved in the siege should be commended, Drilon said, adding that he did not know how the regional director could reconcile the two statements. Drilon, a political ally of Tupas, said Dulay said he had received orders from above but did not identify the person he was referring too.