The PNP Report states that “the Investigation Committee concluded that the blame on the November 16, 2004 incident could not be attributed to the PNP organization and its chain of command in the light of the fact that all available steps to forestall the enforcement of the DOLE order have been exhausted.”

On the other hand, the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) together with other organizations conducted a thoroughgoing investigation into the events and circumstances preceding the Hacienda Luisita Massacre as well as the facts and circumstances surrounding the Massacre itself and its aftermath. This investigation was begun immediately after the incident and continued for two months thereafter and became the basis for criminal and administrative cases filed against Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas and other officials of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), officers and men of the PNP Regional III and AFP Northern Luzon Command, and Representative Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino by the surviving victims and the relatives of those slain on 13 January 2005 at the Office of the Ombudsman.

Bayan undertook the task of poring over the PNP report to find out the police version of what happened at the Hacienda Luisita massacre and who was responsible. Here are our findings:

1. The 422-page PNP report is nothing but a bunch of lies meant to suppress the truth, deceive the public, obstruct justice, and clear the PNP and AFP, and indirectly, higher government authorities as well as the owners of Hacienda Luisita and Central Azucarera de Tarlac (CAT), of any responsibility for the massacre, frustrated killings, serious injuries, unjustified arrests, and destruction of properties of the strikers and their supporters, in the violent dispersal on 16 November 2004 of the peaceful strike at the Hacienda Luisita and CAT.

This bunch of lies includes the following:

a.) The PNP claims that the order for the dispersal operation was made only after police officials saw that negotiations between the DOLE Sheriff and leaders of the striking workers had failed.

Contrary to the claims of PNP and AFP officials, no negotiations ever took place in the afternoon of 16 November 2004 before the dispersal. There was neither time nor opportunity given to the leaders of CATLU and ULWU to talk to DOLE Sheriff Francis Reyes and officers of the PNP’s Task Force Luisita and AFP’s Task Force Alalay. The union leaders had just arrived from their dialogue with former congressman Jose “Peping” Cojuangco in Makati, which incidentally, did not result in an amicable solution to the strike, when the dispersal operations went into full swing.

Instead of serving the assumption of jurisdiction and return-to-work order to CATLU officers who were stationed just across the Gate 2, Sheriff Reyes, backed up by police and military forces inside the CAT compound, merely approached Gate 1 and used a megaphone to order the strikers belonging to ULWU to leave the picket line. Please take note that the DOLE return to work order was addressed to CATLU.

The fact that in the sworn statements of police officers, including that of P/Supt. Angelo Sunglao, commander of Task Force Luisita, the said officers could not state the names of the strike leaders who allegedly negotiated with Sheriff Reyes and/or police officials only corroborates the claim of the strikers that no negotiations took place before the PNP and AFP assaulted the strikers with water cannon, tear gas, and gunfire at Gate 1.

b.) The PNP claims that they observed “maximum tolerance” from the onset of the strike and their task was merely to assist the DOLE official in serving the return to work order.

Contrary to these claims and exceeding the bounds of their authority, the PNP had in fact already decided on the legality of the strike in Hacienda Luisita and the CAT long before the DOLE assumed jurisdiction over the labor dispute and issued the return-to-work order on 10 November 2004. The PNP, headed by P/Supt. Sunglao, did this by launching unprovoked and unjustified dispersal operations on the first and second days of the strike, that is, on Nov. 6 and 7, 2004.

The PNP’s purported exercise of “maximum tolerance” would more appropriately and rightfully be said in relation to the brazen murders of Marcelino “Ka Marcing” Beltran, a key witness in the November 16 massacre, Councilor Abel Ladera, the strikers’ staunch supporter and ally in the Tarlac City Council, and Fr. William Tadena, religious leader and active supporter of the striking workers; the armed assaults and frustrated killings at the picket line; and other strike-related harassment against the strikers, their families and communities. This is due to the fact that the PNP has a zero track record when it comes to the investigation of said violent crimes inflicted on the farm and mill workers and their supporters.

c.) The PNP claims that the “initial burst of gunfires (sic), single shots in succession, came from the ranks of the striking workers after they crossed the gate and invaded the CAT compound.”

If it were true that several armed men infiltrated the ranks of the strikers, why were there no police or military elements who sustained any gunshot wounds during the violent dispersal, and why would the supposed armed men (New People’s Army or NPA members according to PNP report) shoot the armed personnel carriers (APCs) that are impervious to ordinary rifle fire but not aim their weapons at the thick phalanx of more than 600 military and policemen inside the CAT compound?

The victims’ accounts, their medical certificates, autopsy reports of the dead strikers and other documents show that most of [many of?] the strikers sustained frontal shots. They were shot in the chest, arms, and other parts of the body while facing Gate 1 during the first volley of gunfire.

Gunfire also came from the back of the strikers when they turned their back to Gate 1 and scampered away. Several witnesses pointed to snipers --armed plainclothesmen -- pre-positioned at the canal and Texas gate towers inside the CAT compound even before the violent dispersal operation started.

It must also be pointed out that the strikers would not have gotten inside the CAT compound were it not for the forcible opening of gate 1 by the APC which had deliberately rammed into it when water cannon and teargas failed to disperse the strikers. Momentarily, scores of strikers were able to enter past Gate 1 as they angrily threw sticks, stones and whatever they could lay their hands on, at the APC. However, they were repulsed soon after by a hail of gunfire from the direction of the police and the military men facing Gate 1.

d) The PNP report insists that the evidence gathered, “only confirms the presence and participation (of the NPA) in the strike.” However, the same report admits that the “evidence gathered against alleged members of the NPA will not suffice for their criminal prosecution.”

The serious irregularities in the conduct of the crime scene investigation gives credence to allegations of the strikers that that most of the evidence the police is using against the strikers and alleged members of NPA were in fact planted. Bayan contends that the PNP-SOCO team, which was dispatched to investigate the incident, was actually undertaking a “cover-up” of police and military culpability for the Hacienda Luisita Massacre.

PO3 ALEXHANDRO AGSALDA Y JUAN, Evidence Custodian –RCLO PRO3 and member of SOCO Team, narrated in his affidavit (“A-6”) that:
“17 T Noong itinuloy ninyo kinabukasan, ika-17 ng Nobyembre 2004, ano naman ang nangyari?
“S Kinabukasan po ay itinuloy nga namin at noong mga bandang humigit kumulang alas 9:30 ng umaga ay may nag-abot ng isang VHS cassette case na may mga laman ng mga basyo buhat sa iba’t ibang kalibre ng baril sa akin buhat sa dalawang lalaki na ang isa ay may malaking video camera.
“19 T Noong inabot sa iyo ng dalawang lalaki ang mga nabanggit mong basyo. Hindi mo ba naitanong sa kanila kung saan namn nila ito nakuha?
”S Tinanong ko po sila ngunit ang sabi lang nila ay ” DOON” at bigla na lang silang umalis.
”21 T Maaari mo bang sabihin kung anu-anong kalibre naman ang mga basyo na ibinigay sa iyo?
”S May 79 piraso ng M16, 2 piraso ng .45, at 1 piraso ng .9mm.”

This testimony clearly shows that police investigators allowed unauthorized and unidentified persons at the crime scene during the investigation. Worse, these unauthorized persons interfered directly in the collection and preservation of evidence for which they were not called to account, instead the tampered evidence they submitted were taken as basis for their deliberately sloppy investigation.
For starters, if PO3 Agsalda really knew how a proper investigation should be done, why did he not bother to ask for the identities of the two men who gave him the cassette case loaded with bullet shells?

The PNP report is a documented attempt by government authorities to cover up what really happened, exculpate government responsibility as well as support and strengthen the unfounded claims by the Cojuangcos that the strike is illegal and that the concerted actions by the CATLU and ULWU members were instigated and infiltrated by the NPA.

2. The PNP report is completely silent about the police barricade and military takeover of San Martin de Porres Hospital before, during and after the dispersal. Bayan investigation turned up this fact and raises questions about whether the PNP and AFP planned the violent dispersal and subsequent mopping up operations way ahead of any so-called provocation by the strikers.

3. Further, in its desperate attempt to cleanse the PNP’s hands of its culpability and liability for the multiple murder and frustrated multiple murder perpetrated against the striking workers and their supporters, the PNP report even tries to muddle the issues and sow intrigue against the organizations and individuals supporting the strike.

“I also requested the Honorable JOSE D VENECIA, Speaker of the House of Representatives, to look into the propriety of the presence of Representatives Satur Ocampo, Teddy Casino and Rafael Mariano in the afternoon of November 15, 2004 at the picket line and of their remarks made therein. ” (PDG Edgardo Aglipay’s letter to Senator Jinggoy Estrada, 18 January 2005)

4. If the PNP were really so assiduous in performing its duties vis-à-vis the labor dispute in Hacienda Luisita and CAT, as shown by the speed and apparent violations of due process by which they arrested more than a hundred strikers during the violent dispersal on 16 November 2004, why has the PNP proven inutile in apprehending four people, alleged bodyguards of Congressman Noynoy Aquino, who shot two strikers on 5 January 2005? This is so, despite the presence of the police stationed at the West Gate of the hacienda where the incident took place. The PNP remains inutile in addressing the series of crimes perpetrated against the striking workers of Hacienda Luisita and their supporters even after the Hacienda Luisita Massacre. We reiterate that no substantial investigation has been made on the assassinations of peasant leader Marcelino Beltran, Tarlac City Councilor Abel Ladera, and religious leader Fr. William Tadena. During the entire six months of the strike, the PNP machinery has brazenly shown its subservience to the whims and caprices of the Cojuangcos and submissiveness to the abusive conduct of the AFP and paramilitary units at the picket lines and in the communities of Hacienda Luisita.

The deliberate incompetence of the PNP, as exemplified in this report, best serves the interest of the despotic owners and management of Hacienda Luisita and CAT. It serves as well to absolve the Macapagal-Arroyo government of its bloody and criminal complicity in the Hacienda Luisita Massacre and the continuing exploitation and oppression of the starving sugar and mill workers and their families.