THE peace negotiations allowed communist rebels to grow their numbers, particularly in Eastern Mindanao, military spokesman Maj. Gen. Restituto Padilla said Friday.
Padilla said it was “only logical” that the communist New People’s Army grew in number “because of the period of peace brought about by the peace talks and the relative lack of concrete government action to check their movements.”
“It was apparent that they would have used that to their advantage and that they wanted to increase their membership through recruitment,” Padilla said.
Padilla said that the biggest number of NPA rebels came from Eastern Mindanao, and noted that intelligence sources said that “three out of four armed rebels in that region were lumad or tribal natives.
After the President ended formal peace talks with the National Democratic Front, the country should brace for “increasing violence” initiated by leftist forces.
“That’s part of the reason why martial law may be needed to cover other areas where potential terrorists are in hiding,” he said.
Citing data from the military—from the period of January to Nov. 30 this year, there has been a 65 percent overall increase in the violent incidents involving the NPA in Eastern Mindanao and Western Mindanao.
There were a total of 617 incidents for the whole of the year and 382 of them were committed in the Eastern Mindanao Command area and 18 in the Western Mindanao Command area, Padilla said.
President Rodrigo Duterte had earlier branded the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the NPA, as a “terrorist organization.”
The government’s chief peace negotiator, Labor Secretary Silvestre H. Bello III, however, said he remained hopeful the peace process could still work, but with only a small window of opportunity.
He described the breakdown in talks as “one of the big humps in the road to peace,” but said he believed the President wanted to leave a legacy of an inclusive and lasting peace.
“I’m sure the humps will someday disappear and we will be back on the road to peace,” he added.
Also on Friday, Rights group Karapatan said that it has written the United Nations special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous people Victoria Tauli-Corpuz to report the reported atrocities against the lumad in Mindanao.
The group decried the alleged massacre of eight T’boli and Dulangan Manobo in Lake Sebu, South Cotabato and evacuations in Surigao del Sur, Sarangani and Agusan del Sur.
“We urge you and your office… to conduct an independent investigation on the recent massacre of eight Lumad in South Cotabato towards the swift prosecution of the perpetrators of the said crime, to help stop the food blockades on displaced indigenous peoples in Surigao del Sur and Agusan del Sur, and to urge the Philippine government to stop its military operations in civilian communities, including that of indigenous peoples in Mindanao,” Cristina Palabay, secretary general of Karapatan, said.
The military, meanwhile, said it was ready to cooperate with the Commission on Human Rights investigation into the killing for Fr. Marcelito Paez in Nueva Ecija and the deaths of 14 alleged NPA members in a clash in Batangas.