The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) extends profoundest sympathies and solidarity to the millions of Filipinos who have suffered tremendous losses due to widespread floods and landslides over the past week. This come as a result of heavy rains brought about by successive typhoons Crising, Dante and Emong, which combined with southwest (Habagat) monsoon rains that have swept across across Luzon and parts of Visayas and Mindanao.
Tens of thousands of families have lost homes, property and livelihood. A number of lives have been lost. The widespread devastation come on top of the losses following similar floods less than a year ago, from which the broad toiling masses have yet to fully recover from. Thousands of families are currently sheltered in evacuation centers in almost all provinces, exposing children to disease and illnesses.
In the cities, the masses of workers and semiproletariat are the worst to suffer as floods engulfed entire communities, especially those near creeks and rivers. In many areas, flooding made roads impassable and public transportation unavailable, forcing the suspension of economic activities and leaving daily wage earners without income to meet their family’s needs.
In rural areas, flood waters have forced people out of their homes and communities. Wide swathes of rice fields and agricultural land are inundated, damaging crops and livestock, causing untold economic losses to hundreds of thousands of peasants, leaving them under layers of debt. Millions in the countryside face the threat of even worse hunger and poverty in the coming months.
Amid the devastation and the lackadaisical response of government, revolutionary forces, especially those in workers communities and rural villages engulfed by floods, have mobilized their forces to address the urgent need for food, water, clothing and other essentials of millions of people suffering. They have coordinated their collective efforts with various relief agencies to bring aid to families requiring urgent aid.
The response of the Marcos government and its agencies is highly deplorable and shameful. It touts distribution of meager “food packs,” boasts of “relief efforts” and brags “declogging” operations to whitewash its direct responsibility for the flooding and devastation.
Marcos’ reckless pursuit of foreign-funded infrastructure projects and investments has led to abandonment of environmental regulation under the so-called “green lane.” This has intensified rampant quarrying of rivers and mining operations, ravaging the environment and the natural landscape. Ill-conceived infrastructure projects, including real estate development and land reclamation, malls, bridges and expressways have destroyed vital waterways and reduced the capacity of land to absorb water, exacerbating flooding.
The devastating floods across the country are a direct consequence of the relentless drive for profit by big business and their foreign corporate and financial partners, and for kickbacks of corrupt bureaucrat capitalists under the current Marcos regime, as well as previous regimes. This is a stark reflection of of the gross state of the semicolonial and semifeudal system in the Philippines, that serve the interests of the imperialists and the local ruling classes, to the detriment of the people’s rights and welfare, and the environment.
The Party urges the people, especially victims of the recent and past catastrophes, to get organized and demand compensation for the disaster caused by the policies of the Marcos regime. They must work with progressive scientists, researchers and environmentalists to expose and condemn the destruction caused by the policies and priorities of the Marcos regime, and demand a stop to disaster-inducing projects.
More importantly, the Filipino people must wage a national democratic revolution to put an end to imperialist domination and the rule of local exploiting classes. Climate change has underscored the urgency of waging this revolution. The unabated plunder and deregulated accumulation of wealth and capital must be brought to an end.
