Archive for category: Statements

Information Bureau | Communist Party of the Philippines
31 July 2017

Duterte’s tirades against Prof. Jose Ma. Sison are a vain attempt to derogate a giant of a revolutionary intellectual and leader. In relentlessly attacking Ka Joma, Duterte is overcompensating for his drug-shrivelled and power-intoxicated brain. He has completely embraced the counterrevolutionary anti-communist US line and abandoned all pretensions for being a Leftist.

The revolutionary movement in the Philippines is fortunate that, at 78 years old, Ka Joma remains physically sound and intellectually potent. He continues to give invaluable service to the Filipino people and their revolutionary forces. As Chief Political Consultant of the NDFP, Ka Joma has helped the NDFP Negotiating Panel indefatigably advance the Filipino people’s national democratic aspirations and uphold the integrity of the NDFP.

His political acumen remains sharp and continues to make timely analysis of current developments in the country. The Party and revolutionary forces continue to value his masterful ideological guidance and practical advise.

The young Red fighters of the NPA as well as young activists of the national democratic movement continue to be inspired by Ka Joma’s sterling record as a revolutionary fighter and leader, his experience as a field general of the NPA and his impecable record as a Party leader. His volumes of theoretical writings are a treasure trove of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist gems.

Press Statement | 22 June 2017

The National Democratic Front of the Philippines in Mindanao (NDFP-Mindanao) urges all revolutionary forces, the Bangsamoro and the entire Filipino people to fortify their ranks and fight against the Duterte regime’s martial law, whose extension in Mindanao until the end of the year will lead to the escalation of the reactionary state’s wars of death and destruction.

With an extended martial law, the Duterte regime’s naked fascism will target not just the Maute group but also the revolutionary movement led by the CPP-NPA-NDF, other armed Moro groups as well as the struggling peasants, workers and other sectors in the island. There will be more aerial bombardments and shelling that will pulverize other areas in the island beyond Marawi City. It will further intensify the AFP’s brutal combat operations in both rural and urban areas.

It will prolong the agony of the Moro people, particularly the Maranaws, who now strongly demand the immediate cessation of AFP/PNP attacks and that they be allowed to return to their homes. Pressed by the need to save their lives and livelihood, they even plan to collectively march back to Marawi City on the day of Duterte’s State of the Nation Address (SONA). Four hundred thousand (400,000) evacuees from Marawi City and adjacent towns continue to suffer from degrading conditions in evacuation centers and other areas all over Mindanao and the country. They are also subjected to discrimination and unspeakable human rights abuses, which will only worsen as martial law drags out.

In their dogged loyalty to Duterte’s brand of militarism, the AFP/PNP will be further emboldened to violate basic freedoms and civil liberties of Moro and non-Moro alike. It will serve to quell Mindanao farmers’ anti-feudal mass movement, the workers’ fight for higher wages, better benefits and humane working conditions, and the Lumad people’s struggle to defend their ancestral domain against destructive imperialist mining and plantation.

The AFP’s fake news propaganda machine has repeatedly claimed that state security forces did not commit any human rights abuses since martial law was declared on May 23. But this is not true simply because right before the very eyes of the Filipino people, the AFP razed to the ground the entire city of Marawi, killed hundreds of civilians, looted houses deserted by residents, and committed abuses against Moro women. Numerous civilians have been harassed, intimidated, forcibly searched and detained in the hundreds of AFP/PNP checkpoints in the island. Extra-judicial killings perpetrated by death squads, reportedly run and funded by the police and military, continue to victimize leaders and members of progressive worker, peasant and youth organizations. All these will heighten in the next five months of martial law.

Duterte’s martial law has indeed become akin to that of Marcos’s, and is proving itself to be far worse. It is to the great dismay of the people of Mindanao that the first president from Mindanao has the proclivity to bombard the island with so much death and destruction unlike any other.

In his upcoming second State of the Nation Address, Duterte will surely highlight martial law as the ultimate answer to the country’s problem of “terrorism and insurgency.” He will spew out reasons not only to justify its extension in Mindanao but also widening the coverage to the entire country. Having failed to fulfill his promises of sweeping changes for the Filipino people, he will instead give much credit to his three brutal wars of death and destruction — Oplan Kapayapaan against the revolutionary movement, Oplan Double Barrel and the all-out war against the Moro people. All of these have already killed and maimed thousands of civilians not only in Mindanao but in the rest of the country as well.

He will also boast about his grandiose debt-fueled multi-billion infrastructure projects, such as the Mindanao railway, as well as the entry and expansion of imperialist plantations (oil palm), which serve, on the one hand, to favor the unbridled profit-making of local ruling classes and foreign monopoly capitalists and, on the other, the further exploitation of the nation’s toiling classes.

While the NDFP-Mindanao vehemently condemns terrorist groups and their anti-people acts, the AFP and PNP have proven to be more terroristic as shown in their utter destruction of Marawi City through direct attacks, bomb runs and shelling, which will only worsen with martial law’s extension. These attacks against the Moro people ignited the ire not only of the Mautes but several other Moro groups whose only choice to counter the carnage was to wage an armed resistance. Duterte has virtually led his troops into a war they could not easily get out of because of the renewed armed resistance of the Moro people.

On the part of the New People’s Army, which is one of the main targets of Duterte’s martial law, it mobilized its units in the five regions of Mindanao, namely Southern, North Eastern, North Central, Far South and Western Mindanao, to launch more and more tactical offensives to defend the revolutionary forces and the masses from the continuing onslaught of martial law and Oplan Kapayapaan’s all-out war. Thus, the NDFP in Mindanao calls upon the NPA in the island to do everything in its capacity to counter the atrocities of Duterte’s martial law.

The NDFP Mindanao calls upon the people to unite and strengthen its ranks for a prolonged fight against Duterte’s martial law and militarism. On the day of Duterte’s SONA, all sectors of the Filipino people, especially the religious sector and the academe, must gather by the thousands in order to demand the concretization of his promises to the people and to hold him accountable for the massive deaths and destruction brought about by his unjust and bloody wars.#

Ka Joaquin Jacinto
Spokesperson
NDFP-Mindanao

Information Bureau | Communist Party of the Philippines
18 July 2017

The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) firmly denounces the plan of GRP President Duterte to extend martial law in Mindanao up to December 31, 2017. This will result in worse military and police abuses. It will prolong the restrictions against civil and political freedom and aggravate violations of people’s democratic rights. It will further suppress the truth to control the narrative to favor the AFP.

Duterte continues to build the foundations of authoritarian rule under US imperialist tutelage. His supermajority of congressional sycophants are likely to approve without question Duterte’s Mindanao martial law extension plan.

Duterte wants to extend martial law in the vain hope of completing the suppression of the armed resistance in Marawi City. He has launched a war which he cannot finish. The Duterte-US-AFP war has roused the Moro people to take up arms to seek retribution for all the death and destruction perpetrated by the fascist siege and incessant aerial bombardment of Marawi City. They demand a halt to the siege in order to return to their homes. The submission of the revamped draft of the Bangsamoro Basic Law as an urgent bill in congress will fail to pacify the Moro people whose oppression has been underscored again by Duterte’s war to suppress their aspirations. A conflagration of Moro armed resistance is bound to flare up across the Bangsamoro.

Martial law in Mindanao is directed at the New People’s Army (NPA) and the Party-led forces as much as the Moro people. AFP armed offensives against the NPA have been stepped-up over the past two months. Aerial bombings and shellings have been carried out in North Cotabato, Bukidnon, Davao del Sur, Davao City, Davao del Norte, Compostela Valley and elsewhere. Workers rights have been suppressed. Attacks against civilian communities have stepped up. Paramilitaries have been emboldened by martial law and are subjecting the Lumad people to threats and harassments. Across Mindanao, at least 10,000 people have been forced to evacuate in less than two months in addition to the 410,000 evacuees from Marawi and nearby towns

Duterte’s martial law in Mindanao or nationwide, is an assault on every Filipino’s rights and freedom. Under its camouflage, US military forces are carrying out outright intervention through electronic surveillance and use of attack drones especially at night. It is set to be further reinforced by plans to implement a national ID system, which can be weaponized to restrict the people’s rights to free movement and as a tool for mass surveilance. With Mindanao martial law extension and threat of expansion, Duterte can exercise the power to railroad his tax reform plan and other economic policies and infrastructure projects that are detrimental to the people’s rights and interests.

Thus, it is imperative for the entire Filipino people to vigorously oppose this plan. Revolutionary forces nationwide are firmly united and ever determined to resist martial law in Mindanao. The New People’s Army must continue to strengthen itself nationwide by carrying out armed counteractions and offensives across the country to defeat the Mindanao martial law and nationwide all-out war.

Media Release | 08 July 2017

The National Democratic Front of the Philippines’ Reciprocal Working Committee on Social and Economic Reforms (NDFP RWC SER) said rural-based sectors are looking forward to the resumption of the formal peace negotiations that will discuss and firm-up unities on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development and fast-track discussions on other pertinent sections of the proposed Comprehensive Agreement on Social and Economic Reforms (CASER).

“The people’s strong clamor for the continuation of the formal peace talks is enough conducive environment for the GPH and NDFP to return to the negotiating table and discuss thoroughly concrete and doable reforms.”

“Genuine development and industrialization of vast rural areas is possible. If a genuine agrarian reform program, rural infrastructure and support services are in place, farmers can unleash their full productive capabilities.”

“Farmers have the experience and capacity to develop the countryside and create rural industries that will benefit millions. Free land distribution is the necessary first step towards this goal,” said NDFP consultant Randall Echanis who challenged the GPH to “walk the talk” on its declaration that free land distribution and support services to farmers are essential in achieving genuine agrarian reform. “If we are to discuss agrarian reform and rural development in upcoming meetings, the GPH should make concrete its recognition of free land distribution.”

The NFDP RWC-SER technical working group recently consulted farmers and peasant leaders nationwide regarding concrete proposals on rural development particularly in the enhancement of major crop lines and rural industries. The consultation was held in preparation for the forthcoming bilateral team meetings of the GPH and NDFP RWC-SER working groups to come up with a tentative CASER draft to accelerate the talks, with the target of completing the negotiations by the first quarter of 2018.

Based on the NDFP draft, industries pertaining to coconut, sugar, abaca, bamboo and rattan, clothing and textile, pottery, furniture and the processing of meat, dairy, spices, fish, fruits, vegetable and other agricultural by-products shall be developed. “These industries are essential mainly to ensure food production for local consumption and develop an agri-based economy.”

“In our discussion with farmers, they reiterated that particular crop lines and rural-based industries can be developed depending on the actual needs of the people and with the objective of establishing rural industries that will lay the ground for national industrialization. Raising agricultural productivity, and provision of agricultural research and development and support services to farmers were also proposed.”

“Correct policy framework is significant in order to reinvigorate rural areas. The sooner we resume with the negotiations, the sooner we can address the needs of the people and the ailing local economy,” Echanis said.

Gradual shift

During the consultation, farmers from the Ilocos region said they are willing to gradually shift from tobacco to other crops, particularly to food crops for domestic consumption like rice, corn, vegetables and others. “If there is irrigation in Ilocos, farmers can produce crops other than tobacco,” Echanis said.

“Since time immemorial, only foreign-owned tobacco companies have benefited from tobacco plantations in Ilocos and Cagayan Valley. Worse, corrupt officials in Ilocos Norte led by Governor Imee Marcos were found to have misused the fund of the Tobacco Excise Tax or RA 7171 that is intended for tobacco farmers and the tobacco industry, now considered as a sunset industry.”

“While we are at it, it is also preposterous for the GPH panel to continue rubbing in the never-ending issue of revolutionary tax at this point to parry CASER when one of their own is accused of plundering people’s tax money,” Echanis said referring to Gov. Marcos’ alleged excise tax corruption. ###

REFERENCE:
Randall “Ka Randy” Echanis
Member, NDFP Reciprocal Working Committee on Socio-Economic Reforms
Contact Number: 0949-1377260