Among Makabayan Coalition’s candidates for the Senate in the 2025 national elections is long-time peasant leader Danilo Ramos.

Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas chairperson Ramos is the seventh in the Makabayan slate, vowing to champion affordable rice, food self sufficiency and strengthening of local agricultural production.

“I accept the challenge and task of Makabayan to push forward farmers and the people’s interests in the Senate. On the strength of my experiences as a farmer and my social understanding, I will further advocate for genuine land reform, rural development, as well as genuine growth of my fellow poor within and outside the country,”Ramos said in his acceptance speech.

Ramos criticized the fact that billionaire Cynthia Villar heads the agriculture committee of the Senate whose land holdings are not for food production.

“Let’s plant a farmer in the Senate for the economy to thrive and the people to benefit from it,” he added.

Ramos’ announcement was held in Malolos City, Bulacan today, near his family’s small farm that he helps till to this day.

Popularly called Ka Daning, Ramos is the leader of the country’s largest peasant organization that he also served as its long-time secretary general.

He joins ACT Teachers Party Rep. France Castro, Gabriela Women’s Party Rep. Arlene Brosas, Kilusang Mayo Uno secretary general Jerome Adonis, former Bayan Muna and Gabriela Rep. Lisa Masa, Pamalakaya vice chairperson Ronnel Arambulo and Bayan Muna Rep. and Bagong Alyansang Makabayan chairperson Teddy Casiño in Makabayan’s growing number of candidates for next year’s national elections.

Young farmer, catechist

Ramos was born to a family of tenant farmers in Malolos, Bulacan. His father’s early demise while Ka Daning was only five years old thrust him to help make a living as a bangkaso maker, a bamboo tool used for spreading fertilizer.

At an early age, he witnessed how the landlord family in their community lived lavishly. He said his relatives and neighbors who were all tenant farmers always gave their best chickens and harvest to the landlord’s family. During village festivities, the farmers and their children would go to the landlord’s residence to do house chores.

Like many children of poor peasant families, Ka Daning was compelled to stop schooling after finishing Grade 6. Instead of going to high school, he became a salakab maker, a bamboo trap for fishing.

In his teens, Ramos became a full time farmer, planting rice, mongo and vegetables. He worked from as early as 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. In between crop seasons, Ka Daning and his colleagues earned extra income as farm workers in other villages.

In the 1980s, he taught catechism in the Kristiyanong Kapatiran sa Komunidad in Malolos’ Sta. Isabel Parish. He later became an officer of the Council of Formation and Community on Service of the Parish Pastoral Council. His leadership in the Church community was later on recognized at the diocese level of Malolos.

Mendiola Massacre survivor

It was while he was an active church workers that Ramos was exposed to the realities of Philippine society. The first rally he attended was a protest against the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant project of Ferdinand Marcos Sr.

After realizing the failure of Marcos Sr.’s agrarian reform program, Ka Daning joined a peasant group and organized among his fellow poor farmers. In 1983, at the height of the anti-Marcos Sr. dictatorship mobilizations, he was elected secretary-general of the Alyansa ng Magbubukid sa Bulacan (AMB, Alliance of Peasants in Bulacan).

In 1988, he became the spokesperson of the Alyansa ng Magbubukid sa Gitnang Luzon (AMGL, Alliance of Peasants in Central Luzon). He served as the group’s secretary-general from 1989 to 1993. In November 1993, he was appointed as KMP’s secretary-general. He is now KMP’s national chairperson.

Ka Daning was a survivor of the 1987 Mendiola Massacre. He was among the tens of thousands of poor farmers from Luzon who marched to the then Ministry of Agrarian Reform and later on to Mendiola. They were demanding free land distribution to the then Cory Aquino administration when the Philippine Constabulary (now PNP), opened fire at the protesting farmers, killing 13 and injuring scores of others.

Sterling record as advocate

The martyrdom of his fellow farmer-advocates only steeled Ka Daning’s resolve to fight for the interests of poor Filipinos, majority of whom remain to be like poor peasants like himself.

Since the the massacre, he exposed and opposed various iterations of the failed agrarian reform laws and programs of various administrations, including those of Corazon Aquino in 1988, Gloria Arroyo in 2009, and Benigno Aquino III 2014.

He also challenged attempts for Charter Change that proposed foreign ownership of land and plunder of our natural resources.  

In congressional hearings or rallies throughout the Philippines, Ka Daning never tires of presenting concrete proposals to address the plight of farmers and strengthen local rice and agricultural production. He advocates for free land distribution, rice self-sufficiency, and food security.  

As KMP’s leader, he opposed RA 11203 (Rice Tariffication Law) and advanced alternative for the genuine development of the country’s rice industry.  

He was also among the petitioners against the Human Security Act of 2007 and former Anti-Terrorism Act before the Supreme Court.

A popular speaker in rallies and forums, Ka Daning is known to carry a bundle of rice to symbolize his advocacies onstage. He also dabbles in poetry, often reciting his original compositions as part of his speeches in rallies.

Aside from endorsements by fellow Makabayan candidates, Ramos’s candidacy is supported by the clergy in his diocese and political leaders in his home city as well peasant women, medical workers and food security advocates.

The KMP said Ramos’ announcement in Malolos City is politically and historically significance, citing that most representatives of the 1898 Malolos Convention were from rich and educated families – lawyers, doctors, artists among other professionals -– families and names that also spawned the following generations of politicians and elected officials in the country.

“From 1898 to the present – more than a century or 125 years after the liberal democratic Malolos Constitution was drafted, dynasties and traditional politicians remain well-entrenched in PH politics, the KMP said. “[Today, we make] a historical declaration that ordinary Filipinos should be represented in the Upper House of Congress,” the group added. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)