Marcos is delusional when he and his fascist cohorts bragged their intention to declare the Philippines “insurgency-free” this year, peddling the fantasy that they will soon completely annihilate the New People’s Army and put an end to the Filipino people’s armed resistance.
Marcos and his officials in the NTF-ELCAC and National Security Council are fooling only themselves with their pronouncements in their so-called National Action Plan for Unity, Peace and Development, that the NPA has no more guerrilla front in any part of the country, except for one “weakened” in Bicol. These false claims are readily debunked by their own actions, as they continue to deploy scores of combat battalions against units of the NPA nationwide.
They talk of “peace and development” but bring only tyranny and destruction. There is no peace when armed soldiers lord over the civilian population in the guise of “community support.” There can be no peace when drunken soldiers recklessly fire their weapons during their nightly binges. It is a mockery of peace when soldiers murder civilians with impunity and fabricate stories that they were killed in armed encounter with the NPA that never happened.
They talk of peace but continue to imprison on false charges the peace consultants of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) and more than 800 other political prisoners. They talk of peace but only want the NPA to surrender its weapons and give up the people’s cause. What peace are they talking about when all they want is for the people to give up all they have to defend themselves with from the violent onslaught of the brutal state machinery? This is the fascist interpretation of peace, the peace of the graveyard, not the just and lasting peace that the Filipino people aspire for.
How can there be peace when they continue to refuse to acknowledge and address the problem of landlessness that lie at the root of the armed conflict? Contrary to the claims of the NTF-ELCAC, a few road and infrastructure projects will not bring development to peasant communities. They build roads without traffic, clinics without doctors, and schools without teachers, only to line up the pockets of military officers and contractors with kickbacks and bribes.
How can there be peace when the Marcos regime continues to follow the US counterinsurgency doctrine to suppress the Filipino people’s armed resistance, and use US-supplied bombs and weapons against the Filipino people. How can there be peace when Marcos allows the US military to build up its forces in the Philippines, position its missiles, stockpile its weapons, use the Philippines for conducting non-stop war exercises and as springboard for saber-rattling in South China Sea, and drag the country into war preparations and provocations against its imperialist rival China?
Marcos’ claims of development are all empty talk when landless tenants are made to surrender half their produce to the land owner in the form of rent, when farm-workers are paid measly wages enough only to feed their children with instant noodles, or when poor peasants do not have land to work on, and where the military overlords tell people they cannot expand their production, accusing them of contributing their produce to the NPA.
What development is the NTF-ELCAC talking about when the government itself acknowledged that over the past year, 1.1 million people lost their jobs, including more than 610,000 displaced in agriculture. In the countryside, these are the peasants being driven away by Marcos from their land to allow the entry of mining companies, plantations, energy and so-called eco-tourism projects. These are the palay farmers who are going bankrupt in the face of the deluge of imported rice ordered by Marcos. These too are the onion, garlic and vegetable farmers who are losing money in the face of unfair competition with commodities being imported by smugglers and big business cartels, in collusion with Marcos and his lieutenants.
Marcos is an expert at massaging and cherry-picking data and publicity gimmicks to conceal the failure of his regime to address the needs of the people. However, despite all their efforts to weave an illusion of development, Marcos and NTF-ELCAC could not hide the ever worsening conditions of the people in the face of widespread joblessness, economic dispossession, low wages and salaries, high prices, and lack of social services, while government and military officers wallow in bureaucratic corruption. Not even the NTF-ELCAC’s retinue of apologists, the traitors calling themselves “former rebels,” could hide these gross realities.
Through the NAP-UPD and the accompanying Memorandum Circular No. 83, Marcos scapegoats the mass organizations of workers and peasants, students associations, even electoral parties and pro-poor service agencies, for failure to end the revolutionary armed resistance of the people through its all-out war. The NAP-UPD’s reveals Marcos’ plan to further intensify political repression to silence all dissent and critics. Over the past year, officers and members of these groups have faced intense political and legal persecution, with the NTF-ELCAC, the AFP and police leveraging the Anti-Terrorism Law and Anti-Terrorist Financing Law against them.
By clamping down on these organizations who seek redress within the bounds of the reactionary constitution, and restrict the legal avenue of struggle, the Marcos regime, in fact, is inciting people to take the path of armed struggle and join or support the New People’s Army.
While the NPA has suffered losses stemming from both its internal weaknesses and the relentless US-supported war of terror waged by the Marcos regime, it is far from being defeated. The US-Marcos regime and its fascist agents are absolutely wrong to think that it can crush the NPA with their superior military force and relentless suppression of the people. Even now, the NPA is making steady headway in countering the enemy’s all-out war by overcoming its internal problems, returning to the basic principles of waging protracted people’s war, tirelessly conducting mass work, counter-encircling the enemy, and making it punch in the air.
The NPA continues to enjoy the deep and wide support of the masses. The peasant masses, from among whom came the majority of the NPA’s Red fighters, are undeterred and determined to persevere in taking part in the armed resistance to fight for their rights and interests, especially in the face of Marcos regime’s state terrorist attacks against their communities.
The Red fighters and commanders of the NPA have no intention of being defeated. Inspired and guided by the rectification movement, and by the memory of all their fallen heroes and martyrs, they are determined as ever to frustrate the all-out fascist war being waged by Marcos and his fascist minions. Under the absolute leadership of the Party, the NPA will continue to wage widespread and intensive guerrilla warfare and employ the tactics of concentration, dispersal and shifting and quick movement, with the aim of recovering, reactivating and rebuilding the mass base which the enemy so desperately wants to disorganize and destroy.
The NPA, along with all the Party’s revolutionary forces, must exert extra effort to work hand in hand with the peasant masses in the guerrilla zones and surrounding areas, to carry forward their antifeudal and antifascist mass struggles. Based on their capabilities, NPA units will continue to carry out tactical offensives to shatter the reign of terror, punish the fascist criminals and inspire the people to fight with all their strength.
The crisis of the semi-colonial and semi-feudal system, being exacerbated by the Marcos regime with his complete subservience to its imperialist masters, continue to generate conditions favorable for waging the armed revolution. The broad masses of the people are being subjected to ever worsening forms of political repression, oppression and exploitation. They have no other choice but to fight back primarily with arms, along with other forms of struggle, against the armed suppression of the Marcos regime.
The Party calls on all revolutionary mass activists, especially among workers and the youth, to join the New People’s Army and serve as Red fighters, and participate in waging agrarian revolution and armed struggle. All revolutionary forces must strengthen their resolve and fight even more militantly and courageously, to carry forward the struggle for national and social liberation.
Marco Valbuena | Chief Information Officer | Communist Party Of The Philippines
Source : https://philippinerevolution.nu/statements/marcos-is-delusional-in-plan-to-declare-the-philippines-insurgency-free/