The government’s talks with the national leadership of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front (CPP-NPA-NDF) may have been set aside by President Duterte but he has opened up a new front in the search for peace – talks with local units of the NPA and with individual rebels who want to stop fighting.
The President’s daughter Sara, mayor of Davao City, has been pursuing this campaign with local dissidents in Davao. The President said he supports her initiative and extended it to other NPAs elsewhere in the country. Those who want to stop fighting, he said, may lay down their arms and the government will provide them with homes and with livelihood.
At the start of his administration last year, the President sought out his old mentor at the Lyceum of the Philippines – Jose Ma. Sison, founding chairman of the CPP, in an effort to end the nearly half a century of Communist rebellion in the country. Talks broke down last May on a number of issues, including the release of detained CPP officials and the declaration of martial law in Mindanao at the start of the Marawi siege.
It appears that the CPP-NPA-NDF is not a monolithic organization. Even as the CPP leaders met with the government negotiators in Oslo, Norway, the NPA in the Philippines carried on attacks in the field. Local commanders were making decisions based on conditions on the ground.
The world has changed considerably since the peak of the Communist movement after World War II. The Soviet Russia of Lenin and Stalin has broken up into the Russian Federation and the now independent republics of Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Georgia, etc. As for China, it started becoming a world economic power when, after the death of Chairman Mao, the new leader Deng Hsiao Ping, with his market reforms, led China into the global economy. The Communist ideology is no longer seen today as one solid movement presenting itself as an alternative to democracy.
It is against this background that President Duterte is now carrying on his new peace effort, concentrating on the NPA ground commanders and the men under them. In a press conference in Davao Tuesday night, he said his offer of jobs and housing is for those who want to rest, those who don’t want any more bloodshed, those who don’t want to kill another Filipino.
Many of the men of the NPA were pushed into it by economic difficulties believed caused by social and legal injustice. The President’s offer of housing and jobs could be a good beginning; those tired of fighting a seemingly lost cause may well respond to the offer.
The President should know that this same program of economic development and aid applies to the nation as a whole. Job opportunities for all who want them, not merely those who are now fighting with the NPA – that would be an achievement worthy of this or any other administration.