By RIGOBERTO F. SANCHEZ
Spokesperson, Merardo Arce Command
NPA Southern Mindanao Regional Operations Command
The Merardo Arce Command – Southern Mindanao Regional Operations Command of the New People’s Army commends the Red fighters of the Cesar Cayon Command, Guerilla Front 4-A Operations Command-NPA, for its successful company-sized special operations on 23 April that seized 66 high-powered rifles and ammunitions from a private security agency of a large-scale mining company in Butuan City.
The arms cache contained 46 AK-47 assault rifles, three caliber 308 sniper rifles,10 automatic shotguns, seven 9-mm machine pistols with 12 magazines and ammunitions, 147 AK-47 rifle magazines, shotgun ammunitions, and 67 AK-47 ammunition vests. The NPA Special Operations was executed in a heavily militarized Butuan city teeming with elite units of airborne, Scout Rangers, Division Reconnaissance Company, intelligence operatives and 200 auxiliary forces of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.
Posing as fully-armed operatives of the National Bureau of Investigation carrying search warrants, the Red fighters effectively controlled within 10 minutes four security personnel of the Earth Savers security agency owned by Ret. Gen. Nelson P. Nario, former deputy regional director for administration of the Philippine National Police Regional Office XIII.
Ret. Gen. Nario has provided the high-powered rifles for the security forces of Bulawanon Mining Corporation,a large-scale mining firm which started operations in Barangay (village) Bayugan 3, Rosario in Agusan del sur last year. Local resistance by indigenous people has prevented the firm from full-scale operations, thus temporarily suspending arms flow for its security forces.
The Red fighters executed the raid with such precision and swiftness that not a single shot was fired in the 5-door apartment unit occupied by the security agency. This shows the mounting intelligence and operational efficiency of the people’s army. This could not have been possible without the wide and deep support from the revolutionary masses and allies.
Indeed, the recent daring raid highlights the resolve and determination of the people’s army to continuously hold the initiative by successfully countering the anti-people and pro-large scale mining armed aggression of the Eastern Mindanao Command-AFP that backs the private armies of mining firms.
The recent NPA tactical offensive has again underscored the superiority of guerilla warfare in the midst of intense combat operations by the 4th Infantry Division-EastMinCom. It has further exposed the inherent weaknesses and vulnerability of the armed enemy in the face of an ever expanding and deepening revolutionary mass base.
The NPA raid in the armory is the fulfillment of the persistent clamor of the masses in the Caraga region for the NPA to disarm and punish enemy and enemy-backed security forces of large-scale mining firms.
Private security firms backed by the AFP, and acting as security details for mining firms, are legitimate military targets consistent with the international rules of war as these engage in combat operations against the NPA in the course of the US-Aquino regime’s Oplan Bayanihan. Armed and repressive instruments of oppression and exploitation are vulnerable chiefly because they are the enemies of the people.
The NPA masterstroke caught the enemy in complete surprise as it occurred one kilometer away from the Regional police headquarters and two kilometers away from the 402nd Brigade headquarters. It was certainly a slap in the face of the arrogant and blustering fascist troops of the 4th Infantry Division-Eastern Mindanao Command currently engaged in full-scale military offensive against the masses and revolutionary forces in the Caraga region and the shared territories in Southern Mindanao.
The US-Aquino regime’s intensified Oplan Bayanihan military operations is complemented by the “Investment Defense Force” (IDF) which forms part of the state arsenal to secure large-scale mining, especially in the aftermath of the October 2011 NPA raid in Taganito Mining in Surigao.
The recent seizure of enemy firearms is in line with the call of the Communist Party of the Philippines to build and arm new NPA platoons as the people’s war intensifies. Among the most pressing task of the people’s army is to defeat and destroy the reactionary imperialist-supported AFP and other types of armed power in the hands of the exploiting classes.
Indeed, the Butuan raid weakens the reactionary armed forces as it strengthens the people’s army. The NPA special operations divide the attention of the enemy as it consolidates the revolutionary movement and makes certain the ultimate advance of the people’s war on to its next stage of strategic stalemate.
(Sgd.) Rigoberto F. Sanchez
Spokesperson, Merardo Arce Command-NPA