By LUIS G. JALANDONI
Chairperson, NDFP Negotiating Panel
The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), the New People’s Army (NPA) and other revolutionary forces in the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) support and encourage the legal mass movement and the broad united front to resolutely press for the ouster or resignation of GRP President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. She is declared by the people as unfit to govern because of loss of trust and credibility due to evidence of massive cheating in the elections, corruption and subservience to the US. Her anti-people and anti-national policies have intensified the intolerable exploitation and oppression of the Filipino people. It is the sovereign right of the Filipino people to oust a corrupt, anti-people and anti-national government.
By LUIS G. JALANDONI
Chairperson, NDFP Negotiating Panel
The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), the New People’s Army (NPA) and other revolutionary forces in the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) support and encourage the legal mass movement and the broad united front to resolutely press for the ouster or resignation of GRP President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. She is declared by the people as unfit to govern because of loss of trust and credibility due to evidence of massive cheating in the elections, corruption and subservience to the US. Her anti-people and anti-national policies have intensified the intolerable exploitation and oppression of the Filipino people. It is the sovereign right of the Filipino people to oust a corrupt, anti-people and anti-national government.
This campaign to oust Arroyo is the sphere of work of the legal mass movement and the broad united front. Therefore, it is the policy of the CPP that the NPA does not get involved in the street protest actions. The CPP and NDFP call on the various sections of the military and police to respect the right of the people to assemble and their right to exercise their freedom of speech and expression. The military and police ought to refrain from attacking the legal mass actions. Furthermore, the NPA is tasked by the CPP to carry out more tactical offensives in the countryside to keep the Arroyo government off balance and to gain strength for the eventual overthrow of the semi-colonial and semi-feudal system.
In the meantime, however, the Arroyo government should be replaced by a transitional governing council composed of representatives of the legal mass movement and the broad united front. The council ought to include leaders of the working people, patriotic businessmen, academics and other professionals that belong to the middle class. It is expected to formulate a patriotic and democratic program of government and call for and supervise elections to government positions within six months.
The CPP, NPA and NDFP shall not participate in such council. Such council shall be the field of work of the legal democratic movement.
But the NDFP wishes that the said council and the new government respond to the aspirations and demands of the workers, peasants, women, youth, urban poor, fisherfolk and other sectors of the Filipino people.
The NDFP is desirous that the new government have a positive attitude and policy toward the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations, in particular on the following issues:
- Undertake together with the NDFP effective measures to address the prejudicial question of the “terrorist” listing of the CPP, NPA and Prof. Jose Maria Sison, the NDFP Chief Political Consultant. Such effective measures, in accordance with the Oslo Joint Statement of 14 February 2004 and the Second Oslo Joint Statement of 3 April 2004, must be in consonance with the Hague Joint Declaration, the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG) and the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL). Therefore, the GRP shall undertake immediate effective measures to stop the threats to Prof. Sison, UN ad litem Judge Romeo T. Capulong, NDFP Senior Legal Adviser and other consultants and staff of the NDFP Negotiating Panel.
- Release political prisoners. On June 22, 2004 during GRP-NDFP formal peace talks in Oslo, the NDFP Negotiating Panel presented the GRP Negotiating Panel a list of 270 political prisoners and asked for their expeditious release in accordance with the CARHRIHL. Of high priority are the seven Mamburao farmers, the sick and elderly, women and children, and those whose release orders were signed by Arroyo already in 2001 but have not yet been released.
- Indemnification of the almost 10,000 victims of human rights violations under the Marcos regime who won their case in the US Court in Hawai.
- Effective steps to stop the killings of progressive party list leaders and members, human rights advocates, lawyers, progressive Church people, surface the disappeared and indemnify the victims and their families. KARAPATAN, the Alliance for the Advancement of People’s Rights, documented 411 extra-judicial killings and 130 disappearances since Arroyo assumed power in January 2001.
Furthermore, the Joint Monitoring Committee should meet forthwith in accordance with the CARHRIHL and the negotiations on social and economic reforms should be restarted in order to address the roots of the armed conflict.
The NDFP is confident that the next huge anti-Arroyo demonstration on July 25 at the State of the Nation Address (SONA) will be followed by ever bigger mass actions which will eventually result in Arroyo’s ouster.
