Duterte says jail awaits ‘Joma’
President Duterte said Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founder Jose Ma. “Joma” Sison should forget about returning to his motherland if he does not want to land behind bars.
“If Joma Sison comes here, I will arrest him. Or if I were him, ’wag na siyang bumalik dito (I will not return anymore),” Duterte said in his speech during the San Beda Law Alumni Homecoming in Makati City late
Friday evening.
His statement comes after he signed Proclamation No. 360, officially terminating the peace talks between the government and the CPP-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front (CPPNPA-NDF).
At the same time, Duterte ordered the military to rearrest the CPP-NPANDF leaders; and that includes Sison and those he ordered to be temporarily released from detention so they could participate in the formal peace negotiations in Norway.
“I released about 32 of them, political leaders, ideological leaders, to show good faith and the confidence- building period which is really very necessary in talking to them and to the enemies of the state,” said Duterte.
But his tone has changed with Sison, saying he will not allow the leader of the CPP, whom he earlier labeled as “dying,” to return to the Philippines.
“I will not allow him to enter his native land and that is a very painful experience, especially if you’re dying and you think na (that) you should be buried in your own cemetery, in your own town,” he said.
Meanwhile, Duterte shrugged off Sison’s recent tirades, accusing him of sabotaging the peace talks and calling him the No. 1 terrorist in the Philippines.
He said Sison is entitled to his own opinion despite their irreconcilable values.
“You are entitled to your own opinion but the fact is we cannot ever agree on the so many things that you demand of me,” Duterte said.
Sison, in a statement, said Duterte… “unwittingly exposed his scarce, shallow and defective knowledge of the peace process.” He added that Duterte is the country’s top terrorist.
“Duterte is the No. 1 terrorist in the Philippines. He is culpable for the abduction, torture, and mass murder of an increasingly large number of poor people (who are) suspected drug users and pushers, peasants and indigenous people in suspected guerrilla fronts and Moro people suspected of aiding the Dawlah Islamiyah from the time of the indiscriminate bombing of Marawi City to the present in several Bangsamoro areas,” Sison said.
Before this, Sison called Duterte the “No. 1 drug addict” who should be the target of the police.
“Duterte is the number one drug addict in the Philippines and is the most fitting target of the police units that he has turned into death squads and corrupted with money and promotions,” Sison, Duterte’s former college professor, said last July.
Duterte’s relationship with the Left started to turn sour after the rebels launched a series of ambuscades in Bukidnon which left three soldiers dead last February.
But Duterte seemed to have had enough when news broke out of the encounter between the NPA and members of the Presidential Security Group (PSG), leaving six members of the PSG wounded, last July.
Duterte, since then, expressed his unwillingness to continue with the peace negotiations, saying Sison is a coward for leaving his men in the country to fight his war for him.
Bridging the gap
Individual members of the 24-man Senate may act as a bridge between the Philippine government and the leftist organizations for peace initiatives to move forward after Duterte stalled it when he closed the doors to negotiations.
Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III, a political ally of the President, said all doors to negotiations should not be closed as the Upper Chamber is opening unofficial channels to be used by any of the two negotiating panels.
Pimentel anchored his position on the Senate’s acting as “listening or relay post” because it considers all parties to the negotiations as part of its constituency and that “we are in one country.”
“We are politicians. There should be openness,” he said, but in the same breath, refused to consider the Senate as a “backdoor channel.”
But while the Upper Chamber has yet to establish the “bridge” between the government and the Left, Pimentel said his office is already open to talking with groups.
“Isa lang naman yung bansa natin, ang nag-aaway Filipino sa Filipino din. Eh constituents din naman naming lahat yan eh (We have only one country. After all, they are also our constituents),” he noted.
The Senate chief, however, said the CPP-NPA-NDFP should be committed in settling issues with the government in order to regain the President’s trust. “Kasi kahit naman bukas yung pintuan for official peace talks, may attacks pa din. Dun nagagalit ang ating pangulo (Here’s what – even if the doors for official peace talks are open, their attacks continue. That’s what fires up the President),” he said.
“So something must change,” he emphasized.
Pimentel said he understands the President in terminating the peace talks because the NPA has, like in previous administrations, been sabotaging it by staging ambuscades and killings with policemen and soldiers accounting for the majority of casualties; setting on fire equipment of mining companies; and collecting “revolutionary” taxes.
He brushed off claims of leftist organizations that the President is a “dictator” and that he is abusing his powers.
Pimentel maintained that Duterte considers that his decisions, under his jurisdictions. “He is just exercising his powers (President),” said Pimentel. (With reports from Mario B. Casayuran and Vanne Elaine P. Terrazola)