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RISE UP FOR COUNTRY AND DISSENT (Pt. 2 of 2)

in Mainstream

by Pat Gambao

Dissent in the military

The debased culture and unscrupulous practices in the military institution of the reactionary government have caused demoralization and dissent among its constituents. These have awakened their consciousness and revitalized their ideals.

Political patronage, an abomination passed on to the Filipinos by our Spanish and American colonizers, is an enduring feature of the AFP and PNP. The breaking away of then Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile and Constabulary Chief Fidel Ramos from the DND-AFP command was in resentment of the favor and privileges accorded to General Fabian Ver by Pres. Marcos. The fray ignited the 1986 EDSA People Power Uprising.

The defection of bemedalled Brig. General Raymundo Jarque, the highest-ranking AFP officer who joined the New People’s Army (NPA), was in extreme disgust of the corruption in the military and then President Ramos’s accommodation of his allies. Jarque displeased the well-connected Pena family in Negros over a land dispute. This put him in a bad light as the court favoured Pena and turned the table on Jarque who was falsely charged with stealing prawns from Pena’s farm and ambushing the judge.

Amidst the struggling masses, Jarque realized that his greatest mistake was to have rendered service to the greedy and powerful who exploits and oppresses the poor. Having led the implementation of the bloody Oplan Thunderbolt in Negros in 1989-1990, he manifested his sincere repentance by going to the people, crying as he asked for forgiveness. Weeks after Jarque’s defection, a number of CAFGU (Civilian Armed Force Geographical Unit) members from Northern Negros fled with their weapons and joined the NPA.

Corruption is deeply entrenched in the reactionary ruling system. It is endemic and at its worst in the military establishment because of the latter’s authoritarian nature and armed supremacy. Corruption in the military is manifested in the procurement process, in bribes extracted from foreign and local business and industrial corporations, through involvement in smuggling, in illegal drugs, and in the sale of arms and military materials to rebel groups.

Juggling and malversation of funds is just as common. Corruption plagues the top hierarchy of the institution and any dissent or exposé from below is met with drastic if not fatal repercussion.

Young Philippine Navy Ensign Philip Pestaño was found dead with a single bullet wound in the head inside his cabin after he discovered the loading of logs and drugs in the navy ship. Navy officials dismissed the case as suicide although autopsy results showed otherwise.

Lt. Jessica Chavez, platoon leader of the 191st Military Police Battalion stationed in Fort Bonifacio, was being used by her superiors in gunrunning and other criminal activities. She had planned to expose the corruption before leaving the service but she was summarily killed before she could do so. Again, the AFP declared her death as suicide.

The Oakwood mutiny in 2003 by 300 soldiers from the Philippine Army, Navy and Air Force, including 70 junior officers, was an expression of their grievance and dissent over the gross corruption in the military and the fascist regime of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, which she wanted to perpetuate. The mutineers declared withdrawal of support from the chain of command and demanded Arroyo’s resignation.

However, because it lacked strong support from a people’s movement as the mutineers relied on spent politicians, the Oakwood mutiny, as well as the succeeding Peninsula Siege, quickly dissipated.

The brazen corruption is incessant and sickening. Imagine allocating PhP50 million from AFP funds as send-off gifts to retiring generals, over and above their legal retirement pay. Imagine the PNP police director for comptrollership being questioned by Russian customs office for carrying excessive amount of cash (105,000 Euros or PhP6.9 million). The general was with an 8-member PNP delegation that attended the International Police (Interpol) Assembly in St. Petersburg in Moscow in 2008.

The most contemptuous scam committed by the military top brass was the diversion of the funds of the AFP Retirement and Separation Benefits System (AFP-RSBS) for their vested interest. The funds came from the compulsory collection of five percent of every soldier’s monthly salary. The government continued to pay the pension and separation benefits of soldiers.

Meantime, the RSBS funds and proceeds from its investments were pocketed by the AFP officials. Although most investments incurred losses, the officers still benefited from brokering the deals and from substantial allowances they received, charged to the funds.

The Mamasapano incident in Maguindanao, on January 25, 2015, claimed the lives of 44 members of the PNP’s elite Special Action Force (SAF). Without notifying or coordinating with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the SAF conducted Operation Exodus against a US-tagged “terrorist” adversary, the Malaysian bomb-maker Marwan or Zulkifli Abhir, (also known as Abdul Basit Ulman). Marwan was killed, but the MILF and Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighter (BIFF) bivouacked in the area were alerted by the firefight. They ambushed the SAF members as they were withdrawing, resulting in the latter’s massacre.

Operation Exodus was a joint operation with the US Army. However, the SAF was left alone in the implementation, while US authorities and Filipino political leaders and generals monitored the incident from afar through telecast.

It was utterly bad that for the protection of foreign (US) interest and the local ruling class the lives of members of an expensively-trained elite police force were unnecessarily sacrificed. The Mamasapano incident was no different from how soldiers are sent to senseless violent battles and pitted against their own class.

This is a wakeup call for the military minions of the ruling class. ##

RISE UP FOR COUNTRY AND PEOPLE (Pt. 1 of 2)
Revolution strikes chords in the state military

#ServeThePeople
#CherishThePeoplesArmy

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Marawi, A Year After: People’s Right to Self-Determination Violated

in Countercurrent
by Iliya Makalipay
 
It was heartbreaking and enraging to witness how the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National Police, wielding their shields, pushed back and shoved the Maranao people to prevent them from going back to Marawi City. It was as if they were the invaders in their own ancestral land and territory.

More than a year after the siege, the Maranaos attempted to go back home—to see what remain of their abodes and properties, and their places of worship. It was painful and surreal to see how they bellowed and begged to be allowed to go back home.

Two years in a row, they had to observe the Ramadhan in evacuation centers or in the homes of relatives and friends, away from their Mosques and the Lanao Lake, both integral to their worship. Despite government press releases saying that Marawi has been cleared of terrorists and is ready to be rebuilt, what we see are still the displaced Maranaos and the rubble that is the Islamic City of Marawi.

“We were displaced because of the siege and the airstrikes; we continue to be displaced because of the rehabilitation project,” one of the evacuees lamented in a broadcast interview.

TRADITIONAL SYSTEMS, PROCESSES, CULTURE, AND RELIGIOUS BELIEF ALL DISRESPECTED

Less than a month after the May 23, 2017 siege, about 50 traditional and religious leaders in Marawi City requested the AFP Brigade commander to allow them to negotiate with the members of the Daulah Islamiyah (DI). It was an attempt to end the hostilities and avoid further loss of lives and destruction of properties. But the commanding officer refused, saying Malacanang had already opted for a military solution.

“We were not given the opportunity to exercise our traditional means of settling disputes and our right to self-governance,” commented Marawi Sultan Abdul Hamidullah T. Atar, in an emailed interview with Liberation. Marawi, he pointed out, is the only place in the country with a homogenous Muslim population of mostly Maranao, the “people of the lake”.

“We have relatives and clan members in the Daulah Islamiyah. In a way, we are all related, by blood or by affinity, and our leaders could have talked to them,” he explained, adding: “It could have been less disastrous and damaging had these traditional processes were alowed to function.” The Duterte regime, however, had closed all avenues for negotiations.

The consequences of the government’s option: the daily airstrikes, bombings and mortar shellings along with ground assaults wiped out the only Islamic city in the country; it also economically and physically dislocated the Maranao people. The exact number of evacuees, which remains undetermined up to now, ranged from 200,000 to 300,000.

Of the more than 11,000 houses destroyed, at least 37 prayer Mosques were ruined along with several treasured traditional houses. To the non-Muslims, these are equivalent to the destruction of churches, cathedrals, and heritage houses. These were not mere structures; they had been the expressions of the faith, religion, politics, and culture of the Maranao people—their very identity.

“The government said the airstrikes were resorted to out of necessity. But the same government now says it cannot support the rebuilding of our Mosques because of the separation of Church and State,” lamented Sultan Atar.

VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW

“Kung sinira ng Maute ang kusina namin, winasak naman ng AFP ang buong bahay namin” (The Maute group may have destroyed our kitchen but the AFP destroyed our whole house),” deplored Sultan Atar.

Sultan Atar decried the excessive use of firepower against the 300 members of the DI, with 8,000-10,000 foot soldiers deployed against them in 24 of the 96 barangays in Marawi City. Various testimonies from the residents attested to this fact. Despite the AFP’s limiting their access to the battle areas, journalists and photojournalists have amply documented for the public how Marawi City was reduced to rubble because of the aerial bombings and artillery strikes. An estimated 12,000 families or 60,000 individuals used to occupy the “main battleground”, later referred to as “ground zero”.

Much like the number of evacuees, the number of deaths during the five-month siege is inconclusive, especially on the side of the “militant” fighters and civilians. Like many of the residents’ testimonies, Sultan Atar is unconvinced that 918 “militants” were killed. “How many of them were children and elderly?” he asked.

News reports teemed with accounts detailing how, after the aerial bombings and howitzer strikes began, the evacuees left the elderly members of their families because they could not walk for long hours. “We didn’t think it would last this long,” explained the Sultan.

Thus, when Marawi was “cleared of terrorists,” those outside of “ground zero” who were able to return home were appalled, but not surprised, to find the skeletons of their dead relatives. Up to now, no one knows the exact number of skeletons found. The situation has become more deplorable as it broke the Muslim practice of burying their dead within 24 hours.

Where skeletons were found, valuables were missing or destroyed.

Sultan Atar himself lost the engines of his vehicles but he refused to believe the claim of the military that it was the “extremists” who did these. Another Sultan, Saramay, saw his house only partially burned in October, the first time he was allowed inside Marawi. But when he went back in November, he found his whole house already razed to the ground.

The AFP asked the residents who had complained to present evidence to prove that soldiers were responsible for looting their destroyed houses. “That’s crazy. Were we in the area? Hinahanapan kami ng evidence ng violations, ng looting, ayaw nga kaming papasukin (They want us to provide evidence of the violations, of the looting when they won’t even allow us [in Marawi],” remarked Sultan Atar.

There are about 2,000 documented cases of violations of human rights and international law. “Pero ayaw muna i-public ng mga evacuees (The evacuees are hesitant to make these documents public) because they may be subjected to further harassments or for fear that they might be kicked out from the shelter,” he added.

EVACUATION, DISCRIMINATION

Wanting to set the record straight, Sultan Atar claimed the evacuees in government centers in Iligan City comprise only 20 percent of the total number of displaced Maranao. About 80 percent are home-based—those living in their relatives’ houses. “Our families and clans have been supporting us more than the government does,” he said.

The CNN-Philippines recently reported that the Commission on Audit (COA) has already flagged the Marawi City local government for its failure to disburse 74 percent or almost Php 30 Million (of the Php39M local donation) for aid, relief and services for the evacuees in 2017.

Groups involved in relief operations noted how women and children suffer most in evacuation centers as the centers are not gender and culture-sensitive. Women complained about the lack of privacy for bathing and changing clothes. It was also most difficult for pregnant women, who gave birth during the evacuation, to care for the newly born in over-crowded centers.

The daily worship and the observance of Ramadhan, for two years now, were disrupted. Muslims pray five times a day and follow the ritual of ablution before handling the Qur’an. That partly explains why most of the Mosques in Marawi were built around Lanao Lake. But they have been away from the lake for too long and there’s scarce supply of water in the evacuation centers.

One other thing appalled Sultan Atar: those among the displaced who sought to rent apartments in Iligan City were turned down by renters allegedly because “we came from Marawi and there’s the stigma of everyone being a terrorist.” The Marawi siege has definitely raised the level of discrimination against the Moro people by attaching to them the “ISIS” tag.

The question, however, is where will the evacuees go? The residents want to go back to Marawi now and reclaim their lands and their lives. All they ask from the government is to restore the supply of water and electricity and to rehabilitate the roads and drainage system. Sadly, there are no concrete plans for them. Based on the government’s rehabilitation plan, the evacuees will not be allowed back into their own homes, at least, until 2020.
Rehabilitation without the people

The government’s grandiose plan to “rehabilitate” Marawi is focused primarily on raising the necessary funds. This is no different from its “concern” on how to get more support for arms and ammunition to pulverize the members of the Daulah Islamiya,” wryly commented Sultan Atar.

Indeed, President Duterte has issued Administrative Order No. 3 creating the Task Force Bangon Marawi (TFBM), composed of various state line agencies, to manage the rehabilitation and rebuilding of Marawi City. Yet until now, neither the amount of the rehabilitation budget nor the source of funds has been settled.

From the initial Php 17-20 billion for two-three years, the proposed funding has now gone up to Php 62-72 billion, based on the recent budget submitted to Malacanang by Eduardo del Rosario, head of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council, who chairs the Task Force. The Php 55B increase is supposed to cover the 76 other barangays outside “ground zero”.

In 2018, Php 10B has been allocated from the General Appropriations Act (GAA). Locally, some Php 3.5B will be drawn from the 2019 proposed budget of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Fund (NDRRMF).

The Department of Finance (DoF) is now considering to float Php 40 billion worth of “Marawi bonds” for the period of five years, the target completion of the rehabilitation program. Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III has also talked about a pledging session among interested countries, with a special invitation to China.

Companies from China comprise the majority, along with four Filipino companies, in the Bangon Marawi Consortium, which is supposed to build the infrastructure. However, the start of construction has been delayed several times because none of the Chinese companies was able to raise the required capitalization.

Already, there is widespread fear among the Maranao people that they will never be able to set foot on their ancestral territory given the government’s unresolved scheme of acquiring funds for the rehabilitation.
While fundraising has been going on, the residents complained that there are no concrete plans for land use in the city, only proposals “to flatten the debris,” remarked Sultan Atar.

The construction of another military camp in the city likewise threatens the Maranao as well as the idea of building an export processing zone.

Residents through groups like Tindeg Ranao and the Ranao multi-sectoral groups have raised their opposition to the construction of the 10-hectare military camp. The construction is worth Php 400 million and is expected to be finished by 2020. Also Php 1.3B in the 2019 GAA will be allocated to the 55th Engineering Brigade of the Philippine Army, for rehabilitation and rebuilding its facilities in the city.

The Maranao people resent the Duterte government’s priority of building military camps and mass housing for policemen and soldiers. They also resent that during Duterte’s visits in Marawi he has never sought out the evacuees and has not even talked about their displacement, about the families who suffered casualties and deaths.

“The government failed to heed the people’s grievances. It failed to realize that Marawi is beyond the issue of rehabilitation, it is about healing and social justice,” emphasized Sultan Atar. His sentiments echo those of the majority of the Maranao who criticize the government for not considering their needs, not only in terms of housing, but their overall needs as a people, as Maranao.

“The major flaw in the plan to rehabilitate and rebuild Marawi is not simply because there is no people’s participation but more importantly because it is pursued without the people in the picture,” said Sultan Atar. “We grew old thinking that we can pass on our lands to our children. I didn’t know that one day, I’ll wake up and it is no longer ours,” he bemoaned.

HISTORICAL INJUSTICE

Resentment is widespread among the Maranao people as days, months, and years pass by without any clear indication of when and how they could regain and restart their lives.

With martial law in place and as “terrorist” tagging has become the norm, victims are generally silenced. The politicians, fearing reprisal and political backlash, have become passive. It didn’t help either that in all these, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) chose not to say a word about Marawi and the Maranao, their fate could have been logically become part of the negotiation with the government.

“We have to break the silence so that those silenced by the martial law could speak up,” said Sultan Atar. And it would help if the majority of the Filipinos echo the sentiments of the Maranaw people. “Habang walang kumikibo sa karamihan sa atin, di magkakalakas loob na magsalita ang mga victims (Our voice would encourage the rest of the victims to speak up).”

But, Duterte’s derisive statements have ignited the sentiments of the Moro youth. Most of them feel hatred for the government. Maratabat, the Maranao pride, honor has been offended. It pains them that they—who have become victims, have been displaced and discriminated against—are now accused by the government of being terrorist coddlers, if not being terrorists themselves. It is a known fact that when maratabat is offended, revenge could not be far away.

When the airstrikes started, Moro leaders, including those in the local government, warned that the daily bombing was not the solution and it could only push the Maranao, especially the youth, to Islamist extremism. The same stands true to this day.

“Pag di ito na-address (when this is not addressed) and there is no accountability, no hope and no chance for justice, we will see a worsening of the situation,” warned Sultan Atar. But he would not also be surprised, he said, if a new group arises, one that is more legitimate than the MILF or the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF).

For now, Sultan Atar could only hope for an end to martial law and for the government to allow an independent investigation on the real motives behind the siege, the extent of the human rights violations, the deaths, the damage, and destruction.

By now, it is clear that the Duterte regime’s solutions—from the siege to the evacuation on to the rehabilitation—is bereft of respect for the Maranao people’s religion and culture and of the recognition of their rights to self-determination and to their territories. It is a response that is far from Duterte’s vow to correct historical injustice. It is a case when solutions actually led to destruction and violations of the Maranao people’s rights.

The National Minorities and the National Democratic Revolution

in Mainstream
By Iliya Makalipay

The national minorities — the Bangsamoro and the various groups of indigenous peoples — currently bear the brunt of the fascist attacks by the US-Duterte regime.

The Marawi City siege — a campaign of suppression against two disgruntled armed groups that used to belong to the Bangsamoro liberation movement — and its consequent displacement of 40,000 Maranaos is only the proverbial tip of the iceberg.  Prior to the declaration of martial law on May 23, there were already at least 40,000 documented Moro evacuees affected by the regime’s “anti-terrorism” campaign.

On a nationwide scale, the US-Duterte regime pursues the nearly five-decade counterinsurgency war, now tagged as an “all-out war” through Oplan Kapayapaan, against the national democratic revolutionary movement which has included as targets the various national minorities.

From July 2016 to June 2017, at least 60,000 indigenous peoples have fallen victims of the counterinsurgency war. This is because the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) has tagged large sections of the national minorities as supporters and mass base of the New People’s Army (NPA) and considered them as “legitimate” targets of armed attacks.

Those targeted as “terrorists” in Mindanao are members and families of several armed groups that have emerged from the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) which had negotiated and signed separate peace agreements with the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) — the MNLF in 1998, the MILF in 2014.

These former members of the MNLF and MILF have rejected the peace process that has failed to address their fundamental demands for reforms urgently needed to realize their right to self-determination.  Even the leaderships of the MNLF and MILF feel aggrieved by the failure, mainly on the part of the reactionary government, to implement the signed peace agreements .

A year ago, Duterte spoke with umbrage about the long history of injustice committed against the Bangsamoro by the American imperialist invader-colonizers  and the successive neocolonial Philippine governments .  He swore to obtain redress for the injustices. But redress, through the implementation of the signed peace agreements however flawed and inadequate these may be, have yet to find fulfillment.

As regards the non-Moro national minorities, the fascist attacks on their communities combined with the schemes to seize their communal lands and natural resources for exploitation by  big foreign and domestic corporations threaten to displace them from their ancestral domains and destroy their indigenous cultures.

 

The NDFP program

Rectification of the national minorities’ exploitation and oppression cannot come from the oppressive and exploitative classes. Neither can it be expected from the reactionary state, which these ruling classes have controlled. Government after government has largely been indifferent to their interest and welfare, and in many instances has aided in perpetuating their national oppression and exploitation.

Recognizing this fact, the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) has committed to undertake the task of rectification in close cooperation with the Bangsamoro, the Cordillera peoples, and other indigenous peoples in the country.  Certain provisions in its 12-point program, which takes off from the Communist Party of the Philippines’ (CPP) Program for a People’s Democratic Revolution (PPDR), uphold the right of the national minorities to self-determination and democracy.

 

Historical injustice and national oppression

By their formidable instinct for survival, the national minorities fought both the Spanish colonialists and the American imperialist plunderers.  They resisted the attempts of the colonizing powers to get them integrated into the “larger” society, fearing they would lose their ancestral lands and their distinct identities, cultures and traditions.

Their instinct has proved them right. The colonizers and their native subalterns and, as already mentioned, the succession of neocolonial governments continually tried to dispossess them of their ancestral lands and territories.  They were deceitfully enjoined to sacrifice for the “national interest” or in the name of the “majority Filipinos”.  Armed terror was used to subdue them. Divide-and-rule tactics was used to pit them against one another and against the majority of the Filipinos. Their traditional institutions were undermined.

Throughout history, the national minorities persisted in preserving their distinct cultures.  But, they became victims of cultural discrimination, Christian chauvinism, and Islamophobia that have been deeply inculcated into the minds of the majority Filipinos by the State through the use of mass media and the educational system.

Today, like the rest of the Filipino people, the national minorities are confronted with the problems brought about by US-imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat capitalism. But in addition to these, national oppression perpetrated by the State, in collaboration with the landlords and comprador bourgeoisie, weighs down on them. The State has become the main violator of the rights of the national minorities to chart their own economic and cultural development and their own systems of governance.

The national minorities are among the most impoverished in the countryside. They are the last to receive social services from the government. Most of them die without seeing a doctor, and most of them die without having a day in school. Their organized efforts, aided by missionaries and other support groups, to build facilities for self-determining communities are targetted for fascist attacks by the State. These include their schools and literacy-numeracy programs, their agricultural cooperatives, and other economic endeavors aimed at lifting them from endemic poverty.

In defense of corporate interests, the State has bastardized the indigenous peoples’ social and political systems, for instance, by transforming the traditional community defense system into paramilitary groups to be used against them. These groups act as the AFP’s “force multipliers” and frontliners in its campaigns of suppression. Military officials are bestowed with the title of “datu” or chieftain to deodorize and legitimize their authoritarian presence in the ancestral lands and territories.

Attempts by the post-Marcos regimes to placate the Bangsamoro and indigenous peoples proved to be futile. The supposed regional autonomous governments granted to the Bangsamoro and the Cordillera peoples were led and mismanaged by the elites and corrupt bureaucrats. The same is true with the various peace and ceasefire agreements between the government and the MNLF and later with the MILF and the Cordillera Peoples Liberation Army (CPLA). All have failed to respond to the basic needs of the national minorities, to protect their rights to their ancestral lands and territories, and uphold their right to self-determination. These have only fueled more frustrations, anger, and armed resistance.

 

The right to self-determination

The right of the Bangsamoro, the Cordillera peoples, and other indigenous peoples to self-determination, from the NDFP’s viewpoint, means the right to “decide their own destiny; to free themselves from national exploitation, chauvinism and discrimination; to achieve democracy; to rule themselves and to pursue social progress in an all-round way and in accordance with their specific conditions.”  Under conditions of national oppression, this right extends to the right to secede.

All efforts must be exerted, therefore, to encourage the Bangsamoro to opt for the more valid and viable option of a genuine autonomous political rule within the framework of “equality of all peoples and nationalities” under the prospective People’s Democratic Government. Genuine autonomy is also guaranteed to the Cordillera peoples.

Self-governance within the People’s Democratic Government is key to genuine autonomy. Through this government structure, the full participation of the national minorities to decide on all matters affecting their lives is ensured. The autonomous regions shall be responsible for the concerns on the right to ancestral land, respect for tradition and culture, employment and economic opportunities, and how the economic development in the ancestral lands and territories can benefit the national minorities and hasten their social progress.

For the national minorities outside of the autonomous areas, they shall be accorded with meaningful and proportional representation in the organs of political power at various levels and in the National People’s Congress.

While encouraging active interaction among the diverse cultures in the country, the Bangsamoro, Cordillera, and other indigenous peoples’ social, religious, cultural, legal and customary laws shall be respected. Specifically for the Moro people, the “historical, social and religious ties with their Islamic brethren abroad shall likewise be respected.”

The NDFP believes that the national minorities, given their particular history and current situation, should get all the necessary support to enable them to “advance and progress with the rest of the nation.” Thus, its program explicitly provides that the central government of the new republic shall extend all help to the autonomous areas and peoples to develop according to their “decisions and specific conditions.”

Through the autonomous regions and the representation of the national minorities in all levels of governance, “equal political, economic and social rights as well as respect for their way of life shall be guaranteed.”

 

Advancing the revolution  

Among the NDFP’s 18 allied organizations are the revolutionary formations of national minorities such as the Moro Resistance and Liberation Organization (MRLO), the Cordillera People’s Democratic Front (CPDF) and the Revolutionary Organization of Lumad (ROL). Other national minorities are part of the CPP-NPA structures in the guerrilla  zones in various parts  the country.

These revolutionary organizations are waging armed resistance which is integrated in the national democratic struggle led by the Communist Party of the Philippines, New People’s Army and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (CPP-NPA-NDFP).

Outside of these revolutionary organizations, particularly among the Bangsamoro, the armed resistance is growing. Absent viable channels for redressing their historical grievances, extremism such as what the ISIS advances becomes an attractive alternative. But an end to national oppression cannot be achieved in that direction, neither can it be ended within the existing social order.

To this day, the national democratic revolution remains as the most viable road towards a sovereign, democratic and progressive Philippine society. Within it the national minorities  constitute a potent force in fighting the common enemy. Its advance and total victory, and the establishment of the People’s Democratic Republic remain the best guarantee for the national minorities to fully exercise their right to self-determination.

 

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