The Philippine government is going to cease talking peace with the Communist Party of the Philippines of Jose Ma. Sison.
The Armed Forces of the Philippines got the word from President Rodrigo Duterte that talking with the CPP/National Democratic Front is useless, adding that local government units would just deal with the insurgency problem and the New People’s Army. The move, according to those following the on-and-off negotiations in the Norwegian capital of Oslo, were heading nowhere.
President Duterte has urged CPP leader Joma Sison to come home and hold the talks in Manila with the promise of safe passage and conduct while here with his peace panel. Sison rejected the offer leaving the President no choice but to scuttle the talks.
A recent survey showed that 90 percent of Filipinos were in favor of scrapping the talks with the Reds who with their armed wing, the NPA, are now engaged in extortion of businesses in rural areas, robbery and kidnapping for ransom.
“It’s just a waste of money every time the government sends its team to Oslo,” said the President. Recall that Joma Sison came home for the peace talks in 1986 when then-President Cory Aquino ascended to power after the fall of Ferdinand Marcos. But the talks with the late Rep. Ramon Mitra as head of the government panel failed and Sison immediately left for his exile in Utrecht, the Netherlands.
In a statement issued in Utrecht, Sison said that despite Duterte’s avowed independent foreign policy, he continues a neo-colonialism path to perpetuate Philippine dependence on the United States.
A meeting between Trump and Duterte is being set up sometime this year. This was according to US Ambassador Kim Sung who made the statement during the Fourth of July celebrations at the US embassy in Manila. Trump and Duterte met at the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit in Manila last November.
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Meanwhile, in the wake of a series of killings that included three priests, Tanauan, Batangas Mayor Antonio Halili and General Tinio, Nueva Ecija Mayor Ferdinand Bote, the League of Provincial Mayors requested a dialogue with President Duterte. Fearing for their lives, the mayors are seeking protection from the executive branch.
In the Senate, Senator Panfilo Lacson called on the government for tougher gun control following the high-profile spate of killings. Mayor Halili was killed by a skilled marksman who used a sniper rifle to shoot him in the chest on Monday’s flag-raising ceremony at the Tanauan city hall.
Some see the spate of assassinations as adding to the escalation of tension in the run-up to the midterm elections next year.
Will oppositions candidates be running scared or will they be helped by the political killing spree currently being employed by still-unidentified politicians?
Motives for the killing of the priests and local executives ranged from the personal to drug-related reasons. The police are apparently in the dark. In Tanauan, Halili’s murder is being linked to drug trafficking. But his relatives dismissed these unsubstantiated allegations saying it was in fact Mayor Halili who became famous for his “walk of shame” when he paraded drug traffickers, thieves, rapists and other criminals on the city’s streets.