The Manila Times

Sara tells it like it is: 6 party-list groups are communist fronts

- Philippine Society and Revolution, Indonesian Society and Indonesian Revolution. Specific Characteri­stics of People’s War in China. Email: tiglao.manilatime­s@ gmail.com Facebook: Rigoberto Tiglao Twitter: @bobitiglao Archivesat:www.rigobertot­iglao.com

“Do not support the party-list groups under the Makabayan bloc — Bayan Muna, Alliance of Concerned Teachers or ACT, Anakpawis, Gabriela, Kabataan, and Migrante.

“These militant groups, who masquerade as pro-people, only want to sow hostility and chaos, especially to those who reject them and the terrorist groups they support — the New People’s Army (NPA), the National Democratic Front of the Philippine­s ( NDFP), and the Communist Party of the Philippine­s (CPP),” she said in a press statement. Exactly.

Sara is mad as hell at the Red party- list groups, and even posted in her Instagram: “Congress should expel the members of the Makabayan bloc. The party- list system is the milking cow of terrorists.”

Sara should have pointed out that the term they use to describe themselves as the “Makabayan bloc” is a colossal misnomer. There is nothing nationalis­t in their vision or program. They have merely appropriat­ed the term to conceal their ideology, which they call “Marxism- LeninismMa­o Zedong Thought.” Party founder Jose Ma. Sison’s

the bible of Philippine communists, is even an amateurish plagiarism of Indonesian communist leader Dipa Nusantara Aidit’s 1965

And even that was a plagiarism of Mao Zedong’s 1938

China’s support

The Philippine communist party grew in the 1970s with huge financial support from China, which even tried — unsuccessf­ully however because of the NPA’s blunders — to smuggle 5,000 M14s into the country. Would you call them nationalis­ts simply because they were anti- US but China’s dummies at the time?

Sara is the first politician of national stature to have the audacity and the principles to tell it like it is: the Communist Party of the Philippine­s ( CPP) has very cleverly exploited the party- list system provision in the 1987 Constituti­on that Corazon Aquino rammed down the nation’s throat, to put in Congress in the guise of parties for the marginaliz­ed sectors, its noisy mouthpiece­s and venues, to advance its goal of toppling the Republic and to get its hands on government funds.

In contrast to Sara, most politician­s have been too opportunis­tic or too cowardly that they can’t utter a word against the Red party- lists, or even call them communist fronts. They have even been contributi­ng to these groups’ campaign kitty.

They brush aside the fact that the ultimate goal of the party is to overthrow our democracy and rule the country as a one-party dictatorsh­ip. They ignore the fact that its NPA has killed probably 100,000 Filipino civilians and men in uniform in their so-called romantized “armed struggle”.

Why do many politician­s do so? Because the Reds can order their supporters, especially in the hinterland­s, to support these politician­s’ candidacie­s. At the minimum, especially for local elected leaders, their acquiescen­ce to the party-lists have allowed their people — for a huge fee of course — to campaign in the hinterland­s without fear of the NPA.

Even candidates for the highest posts — for example, Grace Poe and Francis Escudero in the 2016 elections — sought and got the support of the Communist Party, disguised as the six Red party-lists’ endorsemen­t of their candidacie­s. By doing this, Poe and Escudero betrayed the country, as they practicall­y gave these Red parties some legitimacy, helping them fool the masses into believing that they are genuine independen­t Reds endorsed a former US citizen and a son of a Marcos official in the 2016 elections.

parties and not dummies of the Communist Party.

Do you think the very wily Communist Party gave its support to Poe and Escudero free of charge?

Poe and Escudero have never said a word critical of the Red parties, much less of the Communist Party and the NPA. This is certainly worrisome, as Escudero’s province Sorsogon has become a bastion of the NPA. Are we going to be so foolhardy as to vote Poe, who has been openly endorsed by the Red parties, to the Senate again?

Bleeding-heart liberals in 1987 argued that through the party-list system the Communist Party would have a venue for undertakin­g non-violent “legal struggle,” that it would decide to abandon its armed struggle.

The opposite has happened. The Red party- list groups, as the party founder Sison put in in his plagiarism of Mao Zedong‘ s work, have become a venue for the CPP’s “united front” that acts as the “Party’s shield,” with

the NPA as its spear and sword.

The Red parties, especially Bayan Muna, Anakpawis, Kabataan, and the abovegroun­d federation Kilusang Mayo Uno ( KMU), have been the recruitmen­t agencies for the party and the NPA, with each focusing on a particular sector: Bayan Muna for bleeding- heart petty bourgeoisi­e and clerics; Anakpawis and KMU for workers; and of course, Kabataan for the youth and student sector.

It’s certainly ironic. Dummies in Congress of the Communist Party that seeks to close down Congress as soon as it captures power, if ever, get more than P2 million monthly in salaries and other forms of remunerati­on from the State it seeks to overthrow.

I was told that the party- list groups have received another huge

Its activists have been able to move around the country without fear of being apprehende­d as they

they are members of Bayan Muna or Kabataan, with these congress-

IDs. What policeman or soldier would dare apprehend someone who tells him: Do you want me to call my congressma­n?

A kind of joke going around the party and among frustrated military men is the following: If a high- ranking Communist Party official is arrested, he claims to be a “peace- talks consultant” of the National Democratic Front, as Adelbert Silva whom a few media outfits have identified as the head of the party’s national organizati­on department, claimed after he was arrested recently. If a rank- and- file communist cadre or NPA guerrilla is arrested, he is a Bayan Muna member.

Does anyone in his right mind really believe that Kabataan and even the oldest in that Red group, Bayan Muna, would each get more than 1 million votes to win a seat in Congress if the Communist Party had not ordered its network built up nearly over 50 years to vote for them or else they will have the New People’s Army to answer to?

Most of the party- list groups had to give corrupt Comelec officials at least P5 million to either protect their votes or worse, cheat massively for them — which explains why party- list groups run by rich tycoons and politician­s have easily won. The Red party- lists of course saved on this huge expense, with Comelec officials smart enough not to cross the NPA.

One big reason why the communist insurgency has persisted is that all of the past administra­tions since its founding in 1968 actually had not pursued an all- out campaign against them, in contrast to what Thailand, Malaysia, South Korea, and especially Indonesia did. Contrary to communist propaganda, the Marcos government actually focused its military campaigns against the Muslim insurgency, the Moro National Liberation Front, which it saw as the bigger threat because of Malaysia’s support.

Succeeding administra­tions all fell into the communists’ trap of undertakin­g peace- talks with the communists, which the NPA used to consolidat­e and even expand its forces.

Even Sara’s father, at least as of this writing, seems to have hesitated in crushing the communist insurgency. It’s of course too early, but if Sara continues to be mad as hell at the communists, she will have my vote if she tries

For the sake of our children’s and grandchild­ren’s future, we must have a president committed to ending the communist scourge.

 ??  ??
 ??  ??

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from Philippines