The Golf War - Land to the masses, not decadent asses

by MIM

Filmmakers Jen Schradie and Matt DeVries set out to make a 
documentary which would convey the semi-feudal and semi-
colonial conditions of the Philippines to First World 
audiences. With their recently released film "The Golf 
War," they succeeded. This 40-minute documentary tells the 
story of Hacienda Looc, a small fishing and farming 
community near Manila, where luxury golf course developers 
and local officials are working together to drive peasants 
off of their ancestral land. 

The golf-course developers and the government claim that 
the golf courses will bring jobs and prosperity, but the 
peasants and fisherfolk from Hacienda Looc understand that 
the tourist-dependent project will bring neither. According 
to Romy Capulong, the peasants' attorney:  "Land 
conversion, which the government and the capitalists call 
'development,' destroys culture, destroys homes, 
communities, the environment, and doesn't really bring any 
benefits to our people."

Several people organizing against the golf courses were 
harassed and killed by the developers' armed goons. After 
this, the revolutionary New People's Army warned that if 
the killings continued, it would launch military actions 
against those responsible. The harassment and killings have 
since stopped.

Schradie and DeVries also managed to catch Tiger Woods and 
his dad while they were in the Philippines promoting golf. 
The juxtaposition of golf promoters' claims that golf can 
solve the problems of Filipinos and the reality of the 
situation at Hacienda Looc makes for some great satire. 
"Right now what we need is to liberate ourselves, fight a 
revolution," says one young guerrilla. "Not hold golf clubs 
or play golf."

While concentrating on this one particular story, "The Golf 
War" also provides insight into a major conflict in the 
Third World:  Peasants versus landlords, u$-backed 
capitalists, and corrupt government officials. It also 
concretely illustrates why revolutionary armed struggle is 
necessary to defend and promote the interests of oppressed 
people. MIM recommends "The Golf War" and encourages people 
to work with MIM and the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist 
League to host screenings of the video throughout North 
America.

U$ culpability

The golf course development at Hacienda Looc is typical of 
the imperialist-led "development" schemes in Third World 
countries, which place foreign investors' needs above the 
needs of the majority of the people. The schemes replace 
rice fields with golf courses and toy factories and create 
problems like hunger, poverty, and unemployment.

Amerikan investors do not seem to own a significant part of 
the company carrying out golf-course development at 
Hacienda Looc, although the U$ Agency for International 
Development encouraged its conversion to a tourist trap. 
But u.$. firms do control enterprises worth more than $1.66 
billion and account for over half of the foreign capital 
invested in the Philippines. 

More importantly, the u.$. actively supports a political 
and economic system which allows a few privileged Filipinos 
to get rich through corruption and exploitation. The 
dictator Marcos, Presidents Aquino, and Ramos all had the 
blessing of the U.$. at one time or another, and 
implemented pro-U.$. policies. They were also all members 
of the exploiting classes (Aquino, for example, was a large 
landholder), which make up less than 2% of the population 
of the Philippines. The united $tates chooses such isolated 
local puppets because ultimately they are dependent on the 
united $tates for their political power and therefore do 
not dare spurn Amerikan interests.

To give an example of the magnitude of the dependence of 
the Manila government on the united $tates:  U.$. aid 
accounts for 83% of the Armed Forces of the Philippines' 
budget.

Revolutionary struggle

Led by the Maoist Communist Party of the Philippines, the 
New People's Army is waging Protracted People's War against 
the puppet government in Manila to win true independence 
for the Philippines and to replace capitalism with self-
reliant socialism, which places the needs of the majority 
first, not the profit of a few. "Ultimately it would have 
to come down to armed struggle," says one NPA guerrilla 
interviewed in the video, "because that is the only way we 
can change the whole system, the whole structure. We have 
to seize political power from the ruling classes and not 
lead simply a legal or parliamentary struggle, because it 
would never be resolved by those means - as history has 
proven time and time again."

Notes: "The Golf War," anthill productions, 1999. "Support 
the National Democratic Front of the Philippines," a RAIL 
Pamphlet, available from MIM or RAIL for $1.