Five day NPA unilateral ceasefire in unity with people's traditions and in celebration of the CPP's 40th anniversary
By Communist Party of the Philippines
The CPP Central Committee has instructed the New People's Army (NPA) to implement a unilateral ceasefire on December 24-26 and on December 31 to January 1, 2009 in unity with the Filipino people's holiday traditions.
This would also serve to allow the holding of mass gatherings in the more than a hundred guerrilla fronts across the country to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the reestablishment of the CPP on December 26. Several hundreds of thousands of peasant masses, delegations from workers’ unions and other urban-based organizations and sectors and other supporters and friends of the national democratic revolutionary movement are expected to assemble for huge anniversary celebrations to be held in the coming days. More discreet celebrations will also be held in secret venues in urban areas.
Even as the NPA exercises restraint in initiating offensive operations, every unit, officer and Red fighter should at the same time heighten vigilance against the expected treachery of the US-Arroyo regime and its fascist armed troops. During the unilateral ceasefire period, all NPA units should be on active defense mode, closely monitor the movements and maneuvers of AFP forces and decisively counter all enemy offensives and acts of treachery.
The people and their revolutionary forces completely distrust the Arroyo regime's earlier declaration of a suspension of military operations during the holidays. As in the past, such declarations by Malacañang only serve to camouflage the operations of its armed forces to monitor the movements of the masses and their revolutionary forces in areas where they are set to gather for scheduled assemblies in celebration of the CPP's anniversary.
Armed Forces chief Gen. Alexander Yano has actually provided a wide leeway for AFP units to circumvent the SOMO order by saying that military operations of AFP units in the field during the SOMO period will be “dependent upon the commanders and the threat in their areas of responsibility.” His public affairs chief Lt. Col. Ernesto Torres openly said that AFP units “will maintain security patrols and information gathering even during the SOMO period.”
The CPP does not expect any letup at all in the AFP’s widespread military abuses and savage armed attacks against unarmed civilians in the course of its brutal war of terror that has targeted mainly the mass base of the armed revolutionary movement and the legal democratic parties and mass organizations.
The US-Arroyo regime’s intensified campaign of extrajudicial killings and “legal” offensives against democratic mass organizations continue to victimize more unarmed activists in the legal, democratic arena, including hundreds of activists recently killed and being persecuted in the Southern Tagalog and Southern Mindanao regions.
In the midst of the US-Arroyo regime's stepped up counterrevolutionary offensives and efforts to prolong its rule via its dirty maneuvers to change the constitution or possibly an imposition of some form of martial rule, the revolutionary armed forces should step up their tactical offensives to weaken and accelerate the downfall of the widely despised, power-hungry ruling regime.
