Philippine NDF rebels on Moro-Government peace moves, urge armed resistance

Mobilize Moro people for their struggle for self-determination — NDFP

Thursday, 08 November 2012

By JORGE MADLOS
Spokesperson, NDFP-Mindanao

The National Democratic Front of the Philippines – Mindanao urges the Moro Resistance Liberation Organization (MRLO), as one of its allied organizations, to be more resolute in its mandate to educate, organize and mobilize vast numbers among the Moro people to advance their struggle for the right to self-determination under the aegis of the national-democratic armed revolution.

While the signing of the Framework on the Bangsamoro may be considered a watershed in the Moro struggle, it cannot be denied that the pact itself is riddled with lopsided provisions that ultimately favor the design of the ruling classes, its reactionary government and US imperialism to fully and finally subdue the Moro people’s long-drawn armed resistance against national oppression and exploitation.

Underneath all the semantics in the pact, the US-Aquino regime has insidiously placed the avarice of local and imperialist monopoly capitalists to rake in superprofit over and above the general economic and socio-political well-being of the long-suffering Moro people.  After the signing, like moths to a fire, several multinational corporations immediately expressed interest to invest on and exploit the vast natural resources, such as arable lands, natural gas and minerals, in areas under the MILF’s control or influence.  In his foreign trips and kowtowing abroad, Aquino also used the MILF-GPH pact as a ticket to invite more investments in the country.

Philippines: Rebels warn MILF: “Don’t give up your weapons”

[see the news article, followed by the statement from the National Democratic Front of the Philippines — Mindanao. — Frontlines ed.]

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by Germelina Lacorte, Philippine Daily Inquirer Mindanao

 Tuesday, October 30th, 2012

[JORGE MADLOS, spokesperson of the National Democratic Front in Mindanao, in this photo taken December 2003 in his then hideout somewhere in Surigao del Sur AFP]

DAVAO CITY—Two weeks ago,  amid calls for the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army to return to the negotiating table with the government, Left leader Satur Ocampo had urged President Aquino to “uphold his vow to resume peace talks”  with the insurgent group, just like he did with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

But over the weekend, the communist National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) warned the Moro group against the government’s  “devious scheming” with regard to the framework agreement it signed early this month.

In a statement e-mailed to the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Jorge Madlos, NDFP spokesperson in Mindanao, warned the MILF against readily giving up its arms, and said that agreeing to decommission its Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces (BIAF) would render the group useless in protecting the rights of the Moro people.

“Learning lessons from the    past, the MILF should not easily relinquish its effective military strength on the whim of the reactionary government so that it can continue to defend the interests of the entire Moro people,” said Madlos, also known as Ka Oris.

Mindanao: “MILF hails UN, EU, UK, US, other states’ support”

http://www.luwaran.com

October 11, 2012 — The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) today said the support of the international community for the recent breakthrough in the GPH-MILF peace process has been overwhelming as it expressed gratitude to world leaders and foreign envoys who have welcomed the Framework Agreement reached between the Government of the Philippines and the (GPH) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

MILF Chairman Al Haj Murad Ebrahim has hailed with great satisfaction and utmost gratitude these expressions of support from the United Nations, The European Union, Malaysia, The United Kingdom, Japan, United States Australia, Switzerland, and Indonesia.

“We are deeply honored and humbled, and assured by their support,” Murad told Luwaran in an interview this morning.

Murad particularly took note of the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon commendation of President Benigno Aquino III for his vision and courage, as well as the commitment of the MILF leadership, in reaching the landmark agreement.

MILF urges gov’t to postpone awarding of oil exploration bids in Moro areas

October 30, 2012 — The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) has called the Government of the Philippines (GPH) anew to postpone the awarding of the oil exploration contract in Moro areas in Mindanao particularly those in the Liguasan Marsh in the Cotabato Basin and in Sulu seas.

The call was formally raised by MILF Chairman Al Haj Murad Ebrahim during his press conference in Darapanan in Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao last October 27.

The 64-year old MILF leader said his group has urged the government not to continue with the bidding on some exploration projects in central Mindanao until the wealth-sharing issue is fixed.

Philippines: “Support the Moro struggle against the Aquino regime’s deceptiveness”

[Reporting on the recently-announced negotiations and agreement between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and the Philippine government, this article from Ang Bayan (organ of the Communist Party of the Philippines) traces the CPP’s view of the agreement, its dangers, and the CPP’s relationship with the Moro Independence movement. — Frontlines ed.]

Editorial, Ang Bayan

October 21, 2012

The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and the national-democratic revolutionary forces are among the most ardent advocates of the Moro people’s struggle for their right to national self-determination.

The Program for a People’s Democratic Revolution supports the struggle of national minorities against chauvinism and oppression and recognizes their aspirations for autonomy and their right to secede from the ruling oppressive state. This support is also unequivocally contained in the 12-Point Program of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP).

The struggle of the Filipino and Moro peoples are tightly intertwined. Both of them resist the same reactionary state that oppresses and exploits the toiling masses. As an instrument of US imperialism, the Philippine puppet reactionary state tramples on the rights of the Filipino people to national liberation in allowing American and foreign big companies to exploit the Filipino nation’s natural resources. It further allows the US military to interfere, dominate and freely operate in the country and make use of the Philippines as a platform for its power-projection and interventionism in other countries.

In recent decades, this same reactionary state, from the Marcos to the current Aquino regime, has gravely abused the Moro people’s political, economic and cultural rights. Fascist troops of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) occupy the ancestral land and political territory of the Moro nation in an effort to impose the constitution and political power of the reactionary state upon the Moro people.

The violent suppression of the Moro people has sparked their armed resistance throughout history. They largely succeeded in resisting over three centuries of Spanish colonialism. Their aspiration for self-determination was, however, more effectively suppressed with the supplanting of the Spanish colonialists by the new US colonial power. Using its bigger, more economically and technologically advanced capability, US imperialism, and later, its puppet reactionary state were later able to completely dominate the Moro homeland.

It was only through persistent revolutionary armed struggle since the 1970s that the Moro people were able to defend themselves, gain recognition for their struggle for self-determination and provide it a more national form. The Maguindanao, Maranao, Tausog, Samal, Yakan and other Moro groups united under the banner of armed struggle. Since the start of their national armed revolution, the revolutionary movement has been one with the Moro people in advancing their struggle for their right to national self-determination.

Philippines: Mindanao press reports large growth in New People’s Army

NPAs in Mindanao up 20 percent

By Edwin G. Espejo

GENERAL SANTOS CITY (MindaNews/28 March) – The communist-led New People’s Army (NPA) in Mindanao has grown in numbers over the last two years, according to rebel spokesman Jorge Madlos, a.k.a. Ka Oris.

Jorge Madlos, a.k.a. Ka Oris. Mindanews File Photo by Gigi Bueno

“We have formed additional platoons and increased our armed strength by almost 20 percent,” Madlos said in a statement sent to reporters on the eve of the 43rd founding anniversary of the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines.

He claimed the guerilla fronts of the NPA have increased to 42, up from 32 fronts three years ago.

“We have maintained 42 guerrilla fronts island-wide and increased the number of company-sized fronts,” Madlos said.

The communist rebels claim they have five regional party committees in mainland Mindanao.

Each regional party committee is reportedly maintaining at least a company-sized main regional guerrilla unit (MRGU) apart from several platoons of front guerrilla units (FGUs) distributed throughout the island.

The CPP-NPA rebellion is Asia’s longest running insurgency movement.

The NPA was founded on March 29, 1969 in Sta. Rita, Pampanga from remnants of the Hukbong Mapagpalaya ng Bayan (HMB), the armed wing of the old Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas (PKP).

From an undersized platoon of poorly equipped fighters with less than 25 rifles and handguns, the NPA has expanded throughout the archipelago and became a major threat to national security during the Marcos dictatorship.

It is believed that more than half of the total armed regulars of the NPA today are in Mindanao, also the seat of the Moro secessionist movement.

Philippines: ‘Dissent’ among separatists, some fighters leaving ranks as MILF begins peace talks with government.

10 Feb 2011

The Phillipines government has resumed peace talks with Muslim separatists in the country’s south.

A spokesman for the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) said he is optimistic about negotiating an end to a decades-long conflict.

But as Al Jazeera’s Marga Ortigas reports from the southern Philippines, there is dissention within the MILF itself.

Philippines: US-backed Aquino government continues repression and fascism of previous regime

[Explanations in brackets have been added for the benefit of non-Filipino readers.]

http://www.philippinerevolution.net, 10/12/2010

 

Kuligligs are motorized pedicabs that have become increasingly popular in the big cities. Kuligig operators in Manila fought the government’s recent order to ban kuligigs from much of the city streets. On the morning of December 1, 2010, 700 kuligligs and 2000 drivers took to Lawton Plaza in Manila to take a stand for themselves. In an effort to disperse the thousands in protest, police sprayed them with fire hoses and then violently assaulted the drivers.

The Aquino government continues the fascist legacy of the US-Arroyo regime

Jorge “Ka Oris” Madlos, Spokesperson National Democratic Front of the Philippines-Mindanao

The National Democratic Front of the Philippines in Mindanao (NDFP-Mindanao) unites with the entire Filipino nation in commemorating International Human Rights Day and remembering all activists and masses — martyrs and heroes of our time — who have fallen victims to the gravest abuses against human rights perpetrated by fascist agents and running dogs of previous and current reactionary regimes. We also join the whole Filipino people and the international community in voicing our strongest condemnation, and demand for justice to all the victims.

As we mark this day with indignation and protests, the NDFP -Mindanao, together with all revolutionary forces, strives to intensify people’s struggle to put an end to social inequity and repression that spawn grave violations against civil and political rights. The people’s struggle for basic human rights also include the right to basic necessities, such as decent food, shelter and clothing; freedom from fear; and the right to enjoy an atmosphere of peace.

Even UN Raporteur on Human Rights Philip Alston said that the reactionary bourgeois state, through its mercenary AFP [Armed Forces of the Philippines], PNP [Philippine National Police], paramilitary forces and the so-called private armies, is the biggest human rights violator in the Philippines.

National Democratic Front of the Philippines-Mindanao: Remove all impediments to a just peace!

An impediment to a just peace: The Philippine government has armed warlords to protect foreign monopoly businesses and the ruling class, as well as to suppress the people's opposition. These warlords have been pampered by the government to such an extent that they kill with impunity, as did the Ampatuan warlords in the brutal massacre of 58 civilians, including lawyers and journalists, on 23 November 2009 in Mindanao (above).

From http://www.philippinerevolution.net

Jorge “Ka Oris” Madlos, Spokesperson, National Democratic Front of the Philippines-Mindanao

November 28, 2010

“This vicious systemic exploitation and oppression, which has compelled the Filipino people to rise in revolution, is the root of un-peace. Therefore, true sovereignty from imperialist domination and the attainment of social justice are pre-requisites for a just and lasting peace for the whole country.”

The NDFP-Mindanao is one with all peace advocates and peace-loving Filipino people in the pursuit of a just and lasting peace. We are aware of the call for peace of advocates through the Mindanao Week of Peace. It is, however, imperative to thoroughly understand the nature and context of the social conflict that breed un-peace.

Almost four centuries of Spanish rule and six decades of US tutelage fettered the Philippines to feudal and semi-feudal exploitation. Filipino peasants have been deprived of land; workers, reduced to cheap labour force; and our natural resources and environment, plundered and ravaged. The country became a dumping market for overpriced goods, and a forward base for imperialist hegemony in the Asia-Pacific.

Since the bogus independence of 1946, puppet governments were beholden to US imperialist economic and political interests. Particularly in Mindanao, the Moro warlord ruling elite connived with US imperialists to grab and turn their ancestral lands into export crop production at the expense of both the Moro and non-Moro peasants.

Philippines: New People’s Army releases prisoner of war, demands freedom for all political prisoners

Map of Mindanao in the southern Philippines. The boxed area is where the Moro population is concentrated. As you can see from the inset map, the Philippines occupies a strategic location for US war planning aimed at countering the increasing projection of military power in Asia by the Chinese imperialists.

 

[Some background to this press release and the revolutionary movement in the Philippines: The New People’s Army is the military arm of the Communist Party of the Philippines, which has over 100 guerilla fronts in all of the 11 major islands of the Philippines. The CPP/NPA has established People’s Democratic Governments in many of these fronts.  The Compostela Valley guerilla zone mentioned in this press release is an area in southeast Mindanao, one of the two largest islands in the Philippines. The Moro people are the oppressed Muslim people who live in large parts of Mindanao and the islands south of Mindanao. The AFP is the Armed Forces of the Philippines, which conducts brutal military operations against the NPA and its popular base of support according to US counter-insurgency military doctrine. The AFP receives hundreds of millions of dollars in US military aid annually, conducts regular “joint exercises” with US marines and naval forces, and receives training from US Special Forces units who operate out of a US military base in Zamboanga, Mindanao.

After the US imperialists opened a “second front in the war against terrorism” in the Philippines in 2002, they inserted US forces into the Moro areas of the Philippines in the name of fighting against the Abu-Sayyaf, a small fundamentalist Islamic group that the CIA had armed and supported to fight against Soviet imperialist forces in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The real targets of the US military forces were the CPP/NPA guerilla fronts  in Mindanao and a Moro organization fighting for independence, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. In order to stop the growth of the CPP/NPA and the MILF, the Arroyo regime and now the Aquino government have ordered the AFP to coordinate its counter-insurgency operations with the US military base at Zamboanga in spite of the Constitution’s prohibition on foreign military bases on Philippines soil.–Frontlines ed]

Rigoberto F. Sanchez, Spokesperson, Merardo Arce Command, Southern Mindanao Regional Operational Command, New People’s Army

From Philippine Revolution (www.philippinerevolution.com),  28 November 2010

The Merardo Arce Command-Southern Mindanao Regional Operations Command of the New People’s Army has ordered the release of Cpl. Daiem Amsali Hadjaie of the 25th Infantry Battalion of the 10th Infantry Division-Armed Forces of the Philippines (Serial No. 813144) after 12 days of captivity as prisoner of war of the Conrado Heredia Command-Front 20 Operations Command-NPA.

The CHC-NPA custodial unit undertakes POW Cpl. Hadjaie’s safe and orderly release today, 28 November, in the guerilla territory in Compostela Valley Province.

The order to release Cpl. Hadjaie is an exercise of the revolutionary forces’ own political authority and based on humanitarian grounds. This is consistent with the revolutionary movement’s long-standing policy of humane and lenient treatment of POWs and its serious adherence to the NDFP [National Democratic Front of the Philippines] Declaration of Undertaking to Apply the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and Protocol 2 of 1977.