LAND REFORM IN SOUTH KOREA
By Hsinhua, War Correspondent

Wundang (a sub-county north of Seoul), August 14 -
Millions of peasants in South Korea are putting the great Land Reform Programme into effect under the machine-guns and bombs of the Americans - with their ears tuned to catch the first whisper of a plane. These people know that the war is to decide who shall own their land and they are determined to own it themselves.

They meet after nightfall, with only the stars for light. In every other village, on any night, you find a mass of seated figures clad in white, sitting in the darkness, with someone arguing the merits of this piece of land and why this or that family should have it. They are discussing the proposals put forward by their elected peasants and rural workers committee, and when agreement is general, the land is allotted, title deeds issued and old debts wiped out.

For the peasants, land hunger is the most urgent thing, before which they cannot be intimidated by bombs or rockets. Pak Hungwun is typical of the poor peasants of Wundang. He has never owned a shred of land in his life and was never able to rent more than half a hectare, from which he could usually rely on a crop of 24 bags of rice weighing 60 kilogrammes each - or the equivalent.

Of this, he had to pay 14 bags in rent and three bags in taxes, leaving seven bags to keep his wife and two children in a normally good season. This has been his life of drudgery and near starvation and of his parents before him. Now, at the age of 35, he will own one hectare under the land reform, with no rent to pay and lighter taxation. "I shall be well-to-do," he said. "I would rather lose my life than go back to the past."

Like the other peasants, Pak has been busy many nights since the war began, on reconstruction work, road and bridge repair and transport. He has volunteered for the army, but they are taking younger men first, so he must wait.

This land reform is the last of three in the past five years. Two other 'land reforms' were forced by the peasants themselves by mass actions which the landlords and Syngman Rhee could not entirely withstand and which they, therefore, attempted to divert. After the defeat of the Japanese, the democratic upheaval of the peasants was so powerful that the landlords began to sell their land and otherwise dispose of it to the peasants. Later, when the influence of the land reform in the north led to widespread peasants struggles in the south, Syngman Rhee tried to divert the peasants by carrying out a fake land reform, under which the peasants bought their land in a 15-year spread-over. Both of these reforms left most of the peasants and landless farm workers where they stood and only benefited, as was intended, the more well-to-do sections on the land.

The present land reform is relatively simple, and is a process of readjustment in which the poor peasants and farm workers will get their share of land. The land of landlords owning more than five hectares of land is confiscated and distributed by the peasants' organisations. If a landlord family wishes to work on the land, it receives a normal share, but this applies in very few cases - most landlords are absentees and not devoted to the land or to work.

In Wundang, it works out like this: the population is 7,200, and there are about 1,100 peasant families. The total cultivated land is 1,300 hectares and the land available for distribution is 670 hectares, nearly all formerly owned by absentee landlords. There are seven villages in the sub-county and these serve as the basis for distribution. After the land reform, the average holding will be a little more than one hectare. Families formerly having more land will still retain a bit more than the average. The details vary according to local conditions, but justice in the allocation of the land is ensured by the method of division by the peasants' own elected organs.

This great land reform is following fast on the heels of the people's army as it advances south. In Wundang, the village people's committees were elected, by a show of hands, on July 25. Two days later, representatives of the village committees elected the sub-county people's committee. Both the chairman and vice-chairman of the people's committee of the sub-county were born of poor peasants and have long records of struggle against the Japanese and later the Americans and their puppets.

Already, the peasants and rural workers' committees have made their proposals and these have been approved by mass meetings of the villagers and ratified by the sub-county people's committee. The land reform here and throughout this whole region is, therefore, complete except for minor details, although the area was liberated less than six weeks ago. This is sufficient comment on the mass strength of the movement.

And this strength is backing the war effort to a man. As Li Se-hun, a labourer who formerly had to keep his wife and child on four sacks of rice a year, told me: "Now we have the land and we shall fight to the last man to keep it. American air raids and the American army or any other army will not be able to take it away from us."