Newly appointed Defense Secretary Gibo Teodoro made a deeply rooted statement about the peace talks between the Philippine government and communist rebels that have dragged on for several decades, with intermittent periods of very little progress and setbacks.
Without mincing words, Teodoro said he had always been against entering into peace negotiations with the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the New People’s Army.
This is equally consistent with his position that communist rebels are welcome to return to the government fold given an existing program that offers “to help them, rehabilitate them and give them a new life.”
Why is this so? For Teodoro, why engage in peace talks when there is Task Force Balik-Loob — a central coordinating body created by Administrative Order No. 10 dated 3 April 2018 that supervises the government’s reintegration efforts for members of the CPP-NPA-NDF, including their immediate family members. The task force is composed of representatives from the DND, DILG, OPAPRU, and other partner government agencies.
I couldn’t agree with the Defense Secretary more. In a recent television interview, he said he was never convinced that the Philippine insurgency — the longest-running in Asia — was ideological.
His explanation was clear. “This is all about taking power or whatever. The reason, even in other countries, the sole authority of the Communist Party in other countries is a dictatorship in itself. They call it the dictatorship of the proletariat.”
We have in front of us a duplicity of the communist agenda — a pro-people advocacy on one hand, and the overthrow of the government on the other.
The history of the peace negotiations between the Philippine government and the National Democratic Front, CPP’s political wing, is long and complex spanning several decades. When Corazon C. Aquino assumed the presidency after the People Power Revolution in 1986, peace talks were initiated and detained top communist leaders, including Jose Maria Sison and Bernabe Buscayno, were released.
Since then, there have been several attempts at peace negotiations between the government and the Reds, facilitated by third-party mediators, including the Catholic Church, various civil society groups, and foreign governments.
The most recent attempt at peace talks was in 2016 during the first year in office of then-President Rodrigo Duterte. It, however, broke down in 2017 after both sides accused the other of violating the ceasefire agreement.
Duterte, exasperated by the insincerity, formally terminated the peace negotiations with the CPP-NPA in 2018 through Proclamation 360. Despite this, there have been sporadic calls for the resumption of the peace talks, particularly from civil society groups and the international community.
More than 40 rounds of peace talks with the CPP-NPA-NDF since 1986 proved futile, marred by spoilers who used violence to attack the peace process. Or were these attempts aimed at forcing their way into negotiations, and alter a process so that their demands would be included in a settlement?
Opinions vary, often dependent on political, social, and ideological perspectives. While some people argue that pursuing peace talks is the best way to end the decades-long armed insurgency, others are skeptical about the prospects as evidenced by the little willingness to negotiate in good faith, human rights violations, coupled with unreasonable and unrealistic demands.
Peace is a priority for more than 110 million Filipinos who hope to see an end to the decades-long insurgency in the country. If top-level negotiated settlements fail, there is the Localized Peace Engagement or LPE — a viable alternative solution to the armed conflict.
Introduced by the national government in 2017 after the breakdown of the peace negotiations with the Reds, let us give this community-based approach to peacebuilding a chance.
After all, who wouldn’t want to address the underlying social, economic, and political grievances that fuel armed conflicts?