ARROYO
REGIME-U.S. IMPERIALISM UNDER FIRE
by E. SAN JUAN, Jr.
Sunday Mar 4th, 2007 7:20 AM
Next
month, March 20-25, the Permanent People's Tribunal at The
Hague, Netherlands, will consider the appeals of numerous
Filipino people's organizations on the outrageous extra-judicial
killings and unconscionable human-rights violations in the
Philippines committed by the Arroyo regime (with the complicity
of the Bush administration), violations already confirmed
and criticized by several U.N. Special Rapporteurs, Amnesty
International, Asian Human Rights Commission, KARAPATAN (Alliance
for the Advancement of People's Rights), etc. What follows
is a background analysis to the upcoming trial.
REPORT
FROM THE “BOONDOCKS”*: U.S. IMPERIALISM &
ARROYO REGIME IN THE PHILIPPINES ON TRIAL BEFORE THE PERMANENT
PEOPLE’S TRIBUNAL
With
an interview of Luis Jalandoni, chairperson of the National
Democratic Front-Philippines Negotiating Panel
On
February 21, Professor Philip Alston, Special Rapporteur of
the United Nations Human Rights Council, finished his long-awaited
investigation of the crisis in the Philippines and announced
his preliminary findings on the shocking number of extrajudicial
executions in that country since President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
assumed presidency in 2001. The figure has reached 834, with
at least 193 civilians abducted or “forcibly disappeared,”
as documented by the respected human-rights monitor, KARAPATAN
(Alliance for the Advancement of People’s Rights). Of
that total, 172 victims are left-wing or progressive activists,
mainly from legitimate political parties such as BAYAN MUNA,
ANAKPAWIS, GABRIELA; or civil-society intelligentsia from
church, labor unions, media, law offices, and schools. Alston
censured the regime’s officials and the Armed Forces
of the Philippines (AFP) for their “total denial”
of such outrageous situation. He denounced the official government
“response of incredulity, mixed with offence”
(from Alston’s released Press Statement, 21 Feb. 2007).
While Alston was preparing his statement, a militant of the
progressive League of Filipino Students, Farly Alcantara,
22 years-old, was killed by paramilitary assassins on February
15, 2007 (Bulatlat, Feb. 16, 2007).
Alston
scored the government for allowing, in fact worsening, the
prevailing “problem of virtual impunity” for the
criminals. Witnesses who can testify to the killings “are
systematically intimidated and harassed” by those in
power, while leftist groups (those labeled as such by the
State) are deliberately harassed, intimidated, and imprisoned;
one example is duly elected Representative Crispin Beltran.
Alston pointedly criticized Arroyo’s counterinsurgency
strategy not only for circumventing legislative decisions
to allow “legitimate political space for leftist groups,”
but also vilifying “left-leaning organizations”
and intimidating their leaders, a well-calculated intimidation
that often “escalates into extrajudicial executions.”
Earlier
in the month, UN Special Rapporteur on Indigenous Peoples,
Prof. Rodolfo Stavenhagen, reconfirmed the barbarism of President
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s de facto martial-law regime
in the Philippines. Stavenhagen bewailed the worsening pattern
of human rights violations perpetrated by the AFP (Armed Forces
of the Philippines) and the PNP (Philippine National Police).
Since 2001, Amnesty International, Asian Human Rights Commission,
and other international monitors have condemned the Arroyo
government for the systematic repression of dissenters from
all sectors: workers, women, farmer activists, union leaders,
students, middle-class professionals, church people, lawyers,
journalists, and indigenes.
This
repression is part of the counter-insurgency program known
as Oplan Bantay Laya (OBL) launched by Arroyo’s “total
war” policy against progressive, nationalist forces.
Designed to “neutralize” members of people’s
organizations deemed sympathetic to the Communist Party of
the Philippines (CPP), the New People’s Army (NPA),
and National Democratic Front (NDFP), the policy has resulted
in massive killing of civilians whose total has now exceeded
the number tallied during the entire period of the brutal
Marcos dictatorship (1972-1986). Meanwhile, millions of refugees
continue to flee from zones contested by the AFP, the NPA,
and Moro (the term for Muslims in the Philippines) rebels
since the beginning of “people’s war” thirty-eight
years ago. Moro resistance dates back to the ruthless U.S.
“pacification” of the colony at the beginning
of the twentieth century.
Foremost
among the countless victims of Arroyo’s OBL are Rafael
Bangit, a tribal leader of the Kalinga Malbong community in
northern Philippines, and Dr. Alice Omengan Claver. Both led
the resistance to the dispossession of ancestral lands and
the plunder of indigenous resources by transnational corporations
and their accomplices, local bureaucrat-capitalists and landlords.
From February 2001 (when Arroyo assumed the presidency) to
January 2007, 123 indigenous persons have been killed . According
to KARAPATAN (Alliance for the Advancement of People’s
Rights), the number of victims of extra-judicial execution
has reached 841, with at least 193 civilians abducted and
tortured. A shocking awful news, indeed, for the heart and
conscience of the world community.
Jurisprudence
of Cruelty
Commentaries
on the recent passage of an Anti-Terror Bill (ATB) by the
Philippine Congress have kindled the citizenry’s fear
of full-blown fascist malevolence. ATB gives unlimited license
to Arroyo to classify nationalist critics and dissenters as
“terrorists.” Even without this bill, the government
has persecuted members of legitimate political parties like
BAYAN MUNA (128 members have been killed since 2001, the largest
of any group), ANAKPAWIS (whose elected representative, Crispin
Beltran, remains imprisoned for a year now, denied any trial),
GABRIELA (the leading progressive women’s organization),
and various youth and indigenous associations. Prominent nationalists
such as Dr. Francisco Nemenzo, former president of the University
of the Philippines and head of the anti-Arroyo coalition,
Laban ng Masa, have not been spared police harassment.
Modeled
after the USA Patriot Act, ATB drastically constricts the
civil rights of citizens, particularly those involved in media,
education, and certain business enterprises, by permitting
government spying on communication, bank accounts, and other
private transactions. It eliminates the constitutionally mandated
presumption of innocence and right to bail. It punishes suspects
by imprisoning them without due process, vulnerable to all
kinds of treatment that violates the Geneva Convention and
other international covenants (such as those witnessed at
the infamous Abu Ghraib prison, the Guantanamo Naval Base,
and elsewhere).
The
consensus of media and public fora registers vigorous opposition
to ATB. According to Neri Javier Colmenares, head of CODAL
(Counsels for the Defense of Liberties), this draconian law
will sanction the abuses of Arroyo’s harsh authoritarian
rule. It will intensify the vicious attacks against critics
of Arroyo, in particular, against 8-10 million-strong Moro
community. The Moros have already suffered unrelenting government
surveillance because of its determined resistance to neocolonial
oppression (ignored due to the officially tacit patronage
of the Abu Sayyaf , the pretext for U.S. intrusion) and their
long memory of legitimate historic grievances. Bobby Tuazon,
director of the Center for People Empowerment in Governance,
warns of the ATB’s equation of the exercise of civil
liberties with abetting, or direct participation in, terrorism.
In the same spirit, Dean Luis Teodoro of the University of
the Philippines criticizes the retrogressive nature of the
ATB in deliberately confusing legal media and civil society
institutions (like the National Union of Journalists) with
the outlawed CPP-NPA, serving as “a convenient excuse
to suppress dissent and to curtail political and civil rights”
(Business Mirror, Feb. 9, 2007).
Last
February 2006, Arroyo proclaimed a state of “national
emergency” to prevent the eruption of a massive “people
power” revolt against her corrupt rule. Exposed in the
“Garci tapes” (Arroyo’s secret conversations
with officials to “fix” the votes in her favor)
for brazenly manipulating the 2004 elections, Arroyo has arrested
military officers suspected of sympathizing with political
opponents such as the detained President Joseph Estrada, former
president Corazon Aquino, and other sections of the oligarchy.
A broad united front of anti-Arroyo groups with diverse ideologies
and class background has emerged in the last three years demanding
her impeachment. Two attempts so far have failed because of
bribes, threats and harassments. Universal protest against
the emergency proclamation, including fascist schemes such
as the “Calibrated Preemptive Response” banning
peaceful rallies and Executive Order 464 forbidding officials
from testifying in Congress about the regime’s fraud,
forced Arroyo to retreat and hypocritically plead for cooperation,
transparency and peace.
With
the help of the generally conservative Catholic Church, the
progressive bloc defeated Arroyo’s plan to revise the
1987 Constitution to allow 100 percent foreign ownership of
land, utilities, media, etc., unrestricted entry of U.S. troops,
and extension of her rule. Some speculate that the plan to
purge the Constitution of provisions safeguarding national
sovereignty may have been shelved temporarily. This coming
May election for Congress offers another occasion for fierce
internecine struggle among the elite. It also provides opportunity
for popular mobilization and political consciousness-raising.
But, without a doubt, it will be manipulated again by Arroyo’s
clique, using funds from the public treasury, so as to prevent
any chance of another impeachment attempt—unless the
majority of Filipinos exercise vigilance and oppose cheating,
vote-buying and indiscriminate state terror.
Post-Colonial
Blues?
The
Philippines was declared ‘the second front” after
the U.S. bombing of Aghanistan in the wake of September 11,
2001. Immediately, the Pentagon announced that it was sending
3,000 US troops to the Philippines. In November of that same
year, Arroyo avowed support of Bush’s “global
war on terror” and began calling the Abu Sayyaf “terrorists,”
not just plain “bandits.” As a reward, Arroyo
received $4.6 billion worth of military aid and investment.
U.S. military assistance soared from $38 million in 2001 to
$114 million in 2003 and $164 million in 2005, making the
Philippines the fourth largest recipient of US military aid
(U.S. Congress-Federal Research Division, March 2006). Clandestine
transfer of other funds and resources for secret operations
cannot of course be documented. Millions more were given as
part of the International Military Education and Training
Program, thus insuring that the AFP perform its traditional
role as the Pentagon’s “surrogate army.”
It is no secret that since 1946, the AFP has been completely
dependent on Washington for weapons, advice, and training
of officers (including police) for counterinsurgency and maintaining
the status quo.
Various
legislations have sealed the contract of puppetry. In 2002,
a Mutual Logistics and Support Agreement (MLSA) was signed
between the AFP and the U.S. Pacific Command to allow logistics
support and pre-positioning of war materiel for U.S. military
operations. In the same year, 660 U.S. troops, including 160
U.S. Special Operations personnel, arrived in Basilan (where
the Abu Sayyaf was sighted) and other provinces of Mindanao
ostensibly to help fight the terrorists in open and covert
combat (Bulatlat.com/MindaNews, Jan. 6-12, 2002). This joint
exercise with the AFP was repeated in February 2003 when 3,000
US. army, marine and navy forces were deployed to Jolo island
(Washington Post, Feb. 23, 2003, A30). Plans for continuing
joint exercises in the next five to ten years have been announced
by the AFP and the Pentagon.
The
subservience of the AFP and the Arroyo regime to the U.S.
long-range program of reinforcing its global hegemony after
the Cold War has been confirmed, among others, by the implementation
of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA). This agreement, ratified
in 1999 by the Philippine Senate but not by the U.S. Senate,
has proved extremely onerous, particularly after the Subic
Rape trial (more later). The VFA allows for the unhampered
entry of U.S. troops into any part of the Philippines in the
guise of participating in joint war exercises called “Balikatan.”
This compensates for the loss of the huge Clark Air Base and
Subic Naval Base in 1991; both bases served as springboards
for U.S. wars of intervention in Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia,
Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere. A resurgent storm
of nationalist protest, whose origin goes back to the time
of Senators Claro Recto and Lorenzo Tanada in the fifties,
finally led to their termination in 1991.
Needless
to say, the U.S. corporate rulers need the Philippines more
than the ordinary Filipinos need U.S. soldiers roaming the
countryside. It is no longer scandalous to say that U.S. military
bases have returned via the VFA and other anomalous arrangements.
Buttressing the VFA and the 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty, a
new Security Engagement Board was formed last year to guarantee
U.S. access to facilities not only to ward off external aggression
but also to engage in operations against terrorism, piracy,
maritime disasters, epidemics, and so on. It will use the
US Agency for International Development to promote civil-military,
humanitarian activities (infrastructure, social services,
livelihood projects) that ultimately function as a cover for
counterinsurgency operations.
In
1989, Col. Nick Rowe, a Green Beret Vietnam veteran working
as chief of the army division of the JUSMAG (Joint US-Philippine
Military Advisory group) training AFP soldiers, was allegedly
killed by NPA agents in a Manila suburb. Who knows how many
CIA and other U.S. intelligence agents are deployed in every
level of government and various sectors of civil society?
Sovereignty
for Sale
Earlier,
we mentioned Arroyo’s campaign for charter change. The
Philippine Constitution prohibits the use of foreign military
units to resolve local “peace-and-order” problems
such as the Abu Sayyaf , Moro separatism, as well as the self-emancipatory
projects of armed peasants and workers in numerous liberated
zones. But the U.S. militarists have been accustomed to behaving
as occupiers/“liberators,” as during the violent
pacification of 1898-1913, and General McArthur’s return
in 1945.
In
2004, heavily armed U.S. Special Forces occupied the University
of Southeastern Mindanao in Kabacan, Cotabato, as their temporary
quarters, endangering the lives of civilians. Despite disclaimers,
US forces are deeply involved in the fighting in Mindanao
between the AFP and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, together
with factions of the Moro National Liberation Front that have
refused any compromise with the government. Various elements
of guerilla Lumads (indigenous communities) and national-democratic
partisans are also involved in resisting AFP incursions and
depredations in resource-rich Mindanao and Sulu islands.
Last
year, the biggest joint military exercise, the 22nd RP-US
“Balikatan,” was carried out from February to
March, consisting of 5,500 US troops and 2,800 Filipino soldiers.
The three locations where it occurred—Jolo, Cebu, and
Luzon—happen to be battlefields for the Moro and NPA
guerillas, hence the “exercises” may be construed
as actual interventions into internal affairs, violating the
sovereignty of the Philippines as an independent nation-state.
The CPP/NPA have publicly warned the U.S. not to participate
in AFP counterinsurgency drives lest they suffer intolerable
fatalities and humiliation.
In
March 2006, the US Navy Commander of the Pacific Command,
Admiral William J. Fallon, stated that “Southeast Asia
is the front line of the war on terror.” Situated between
Hawaii/Guam and mainland China, the Philippines serves as
a vital link in the security chain of the U.S. empire in the
Western Pacific. It offers a strategic “virtual base”
for refueling and logistics to sustain military operations
in the Middle East and south Asia, as well as for monitoring
the signs of “Islamic revivalism” in Southeast
Asia (specifically, Indonesia and Malaysia) that may threaten
U.S. economic and political dominance in the region. Cognizant
of the country’s geopolitical importance, the Australians
are deepening their military ties with the AFP. Arroyo’s
sponsorship of the January summit of ASEAN (Association of
Southeast Asian Nations) testifies to the government’s
cooperation in advancing the U.S. imperial plan of waging
a war to maintain its economic and political ascendancy (known
as “the Washington Consensus), complementing the IMF
(International Monetary Fund), the WB (World Bank) and WTO’s
(World Trade Organization) stranglehold on the economies of
the region.
Preempting
Any Paradigm-Shift
When
President Bush visited the Philippines in October 2003, he
called the 1898-1913 U.S. military occupation of the Philippines
“a model for Iraq.” After the end of the Spanish-American
War in 1898, the U.S. was forced to wage a brutal “pacification”
campaign (now called the Filipino-American War) to destroy
the army of the first Philippine Republic that had already
freed the country from Spanish domination. This resulted in
the death of thousands of U.S. soldiers and 1.4 million Filipinos
in what neoconservative pundits call a “savage war of
peace.” Imperialism has now acquired a positive resonance,
if not a redeeming value.
From
1899 to the present, despite nominal independence in 1946,
the Philippines has remained a dependent neocolonial formation
of the United States. Millions of Filipinos have been thoroughly
“Americanized” through education, media, consumerism,
and other ideological processes. Asked in a recent survey
what nationality other than Filipino would they want to be
if given a choice, most Filipinos answered: “American.”
Through various unscrupulous maneuvers (such as the Bell Trade
Act of 1946) and outright military-political intervention
(as in the suppression of the Huk uprising in the fifties,
the February 1986 revolt, labeling the CPP/NPA as terrorists),
successive U.S. administrations have astutely preserved the
underdeveloped, dependent character of the country’s
political economy, its iniquitous class structure and property
relations. It has also guaranteed its subservience to the
combined diktat of the WB, IMF and WTO (for documentation,
see Jose Ma. Sison and Julieta de Lima, Philippine Economy
and Politics, Manila, 1998; and Alejandro Lichauco, Hunger,
Corruption and Betrayal, Manila, 2005).
What
is the fruit of a hundred years of U.S. domination? Today,
89% of 85 million Filipinos live in poverty, living on the
equivalent of less than $3 a day. About 12.8 million people
(16.9 % of all households) experience hunger; at least 10
milllion live in slums. I have seen a report that approximately
3,000 desperate Filipinos have sold their kidneys for less
than two thousand dollars. Meanwhile, 2% of the population
control and benefit from the social wealth much of which is
sent as remittance ($12 billion in 2006) by nearly 10 million
overseas contract workers. This remittance pays the onerous
foreign debt to the WB and foreign financial consortiums,
allowing the elite their unconscionable privileges. Over a
million Filipinos leave every year for jobs in other countries,
either temporarily or permanently—as domestics, seamen,
cheap labor in U.S. military barracks in Iraq, or as “sex
workers” in Japan and elsewhere. Over three million
Filipinos currently reside in the United States, some “undocumented”
and others “in transit”; but many willing or ready
to become 200% Americans, so grateful for having escaped what
Jose Rizal, the national hero, once eulogized as “the
pearl of the Orient Seas.”
Something
unprecedented occurred last December. When, in November 2005,
a twenty-two year old Filipina, “Nicole,” was
raped in Olongapo, near the former Subic Naval Base, by four
American servicemen off from a joint US-RP war exercise, there
was a display of public anger against the US. Arroyo’s
officials dragged their feet in prosecuting the malefactors;
they even blamed the victim. After Marine Corporal Daniel
Smith was found guilty by a Filipino judge last December—at
last, a miracle: a Filipino judge showed enough courage and
intelligence!—Arroyo’s Secretary of Justice colluded
with the US Embassy to kidnap the prisoner from the local
city jail and transfer him to U.S. territory, the U.S. Embassy.
The VFA is then invoked to legitimize the gangster tactics
of the superpower diplomats and their local subalterns. After
a year, when Smith’s appeal is not acted upon, he can
be flown to the United States with impunity. It seems that
the “good old days” of William Howard Taft and
Theodore Roosevelt may be encountered again in this “tropical
paradise” of the global hegemon. Rarely can one find
in the annals of Empire such a self-congratulatory record
of disingenuous colonial suzerainty.
Back
to the “Good Old Days”
A
flurry of journalistic articles appeared before and after
the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq that belabored the analogy
of U.S. intervention in Iraq with the war against Filipino
“insurrectionists” from 1899 to 1913. The analogy
was obviously misleading: U.S. “pacification”
was carried out not to give freedom and democracy to the natives,
but to suppress their resistance and annex their territory,
with millions sacrificed in the process. Thousands of Moros
were massacred for the sake of U.S. “Manifest Destiny”
and its “civilizing mission.” Except for new missionary
slogans and updated apologetics, the same process seems to
be unfolding in Iraq, with equally horrendous genocidal results.
In
the fifties, the U.S. sent to the Philippines two CIA operatives,
Col. Edward Lansdale and Charles Bohannan, to pioneer the
establishment of a counterinsurgency scheme that later became
the bloody “Phoenix” program implemented in Vietnam,
and then in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and other countries. In
December 2005, John Negroponte, the current director of National
Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism Center, conferred with
Arroyo’s security officials (among them, General Eduardo
Ermita, Arroyo’s Executive Secretary, who worked with
Negroponte in Vietnam) to enhance clandestine operations against
“terrorist groups.” In this context, the enemy
not only refers to the Abu Sayyaf but primarily to the CPP
and the NPA, labelled “terrorist” by the U.S.
State Department (which explains the European Union’s
stigmatization of Jose Maria Sison, the chief political consultant
of the NDFP, as a “terrorist” while petitioning
for asylum in the Netherlands; see Jalandoni interview below).
Sharply contradicting the U.S. and Philippine labelling is
the judgment of the United Nations Development Program and
New Zealand Aid (in their 2005 Philippine Human Development
Report) that the CPP-NPA “has not, as a policy and generally
in practice, engaged in terrorism or acts of terrorism by
deliberately targeting civilians” (eBalita News; http://www.ebalita.net/
go/news/news.php?id=2354> accessed October 30, 2005)
Negroponte’s
visit was followed by the intensification of “death
squad” operations. Throughout Latin America, Negroponte
is notorious for having organized counterrevolutionary death
squads to suppress national liberation forces in Nicaragua,
El Salvador, Guatemala, and other places. It was during Negroponte’s
Ambassadorship to Iraq that General Jovito Palparan, alleged
to be the mastermind of extra-judicial killings, led the Philippine
contingent in Iraq. General Ermita reported to Negroponte
Arroyo’s accomplishments in “neutralizing”
(that is, killing) terrorist suspects—at that time,
534 unarmed civilians have been “neutralized”
by government agents.
Arroyo’s
OBL thus resembles the “Phoenix” program in its
target of seeking to destroy the political infrastructure
of the national democratic resistance by assassinating its
unarmed leaders, members and sympathizers. IBON research director
Antonio Tujan observed that “Like Marcos’ [schemes],
Arroyo’s strategy to defeat the broad opposition to
her regime intersects with the long-standing counterinsurgency
campaign being launched by her government in coordination
with the US as the Philippine equivalent of the war on terror”
(IBON Media Release, September 21, 2006). The various agreements
cited earlier and the Philippine anti-terrorism bill all converge
with OBL to form the structure and mechanism of state-administered
terrorism as practiced in a contemporary, true-to-life U.S.
neocolony, the Philippines.
Thirty-four
years after the declaration of martial law by Ferdinand Marcos,
US military aid and political advice are once again nurturing
a brutal, corrupt presidency. Marcos then summoned the communist
bogey to justify his tyranny. Today Arroyo invokes “terrorism”
to maintain her hold on power. In the 14 years of Marcos’
rule, the dictator arrested and detained over 120,000 people,
ordered the summary execution of 1,500 activists, and orchestrated
the forced disappearance of 769 citizens. Arroyo’s method
of whipping up anti-communist hysteria and selectively assassinating
or kidnapping partylist leaders, lawyers, journalists, church
officials—most notably, Bishop Alberto Ramento of the
Philippine Independent Church, the Aglipayan priest William
Tadena, and Reverend Edison Lapuz of the United Church of
Christ in the Philippines—and other activists, have
become so outrageous as to stir up major corporations like
Wal-Mart and Gap into urging the government to protect workers
against exploitative practices (Andrew Marshall, “A
Philippine Shame,” Time Asia Magazine, Nov. 27, 2006).
Apologies
have been offered by bureaucrats expert in skulduggery. While
Arroyo’s generals and her Cabinet Oversight Committee
on Internal Security explain the killings as “collateral
damage” in the war against terrorists, the European
Union (as voiced by the foreign minister of Finland, among
others) insisted that Arroyo use her executive power to stop
the political killings. The respected Filipino journalist,
Amando Doronila, drew the lesson from the international horror
at the carnage: “A government that cannot protect citizens
from lawless killings, regardless of who are behind them,
loses the legitimacy to continue to govern” (see his
article, “After trip, Arroyo legitimacy sinks in quicksand,”
Journal Inquirer, September 18, 2006).
Earlier,
Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur mentioned at the outset,
articulated the principle of the current administration’s
culpability: “In most situations, the isolated killing
of individuals will constitute a simple crime and not give
rise to any governmental responsibility. But once a pattern
becomes clear [and in the case of the Philippines, the pattern
has been recognized by Amnesty International, governmental
bodies, church groups, and so on] in which the response of
the Government is clearly inadequate, its responsibility under
international human rights law becomes applicable. Through
its inaction the Government confers a degree of impunity upon
the killers” (IBON Foundation, A New Wave of State Terror
in the Philippines, Quezon City, 2005, p. 42). Legal scholar
Prof. Raul Pangalangan reminds us of this same “principle
of attribution of state responsibility” prescribed by
the World Court at The Hague and the Inter-American Court
of Human Rights (Inquirer, Feb. 16, 2007).
Judgment
at The Hague
It
is in consonance with the UN Rapporteur’s understanding
of nation-state responsibility (also elaborated in the Nuremberg
Principles drawn up by the International Law Commission of
the UN General Assembly in 1949) that the Permanent People’s
Tribunal is preparing to conduct a second session on the Philippines
to try the case of the Filipino people against the Arroyo
regime and its foreign accomplices headed by the U.S. ruling
class. This will take place at The Hague, Netherlands, on
March 21-25. The first session of the Tribunal was held in
Antwerp, Belgium, in 1980; the Philippines is the third country,
after Afghanistan and the former Yugoslavia, to be examined
by the Tribunal). It considered the appeals of the NDFP and
the Moro National Liberation Front (on behalf of the Filipino
people and the Bangsa Moro people respectively) within the
framework of the 1976 Universal Declaration of the Rights
of Peoples and the international law on the rights of nations.
This
time, however, the Tribunal will hear complaints of the Arroyo
regime’s crimes initiated by an array of Filipino organizations,
among them HUSTISYA (families of victims), SELDA, Bagong Alyansang
Makabayan, Peace for Life, Public Interest Law Center, Ecumenical
Bishops Forum, IBON, and the United Churches of Christ in
the Philippines. These are well-established institutions and
popular formations committed to democracy, social justice,
national independence, development and peace. Solidarity groups
from all over the world will also attend the hearings. Three
charges against the Arroyo administration will be taken up
by the Tribunal:
1.
Gross and systematic violations of civil and political rights:
Extra-judicial killings, massacres, abductions and enforced
disappearances, torture, arson, bombings, mass intimidation,
forced mass evacuation and other human rights violations against
unarmed political activists, workers, peasants, women, youth,
church people, journalists, lawyers, human-rights defenders,
and peace advocates.
2.
Gross and systematic violations of economic, social and cultural
rights: Economic plunder, including the imposition of the
U.S. policy of “neoliberal globalization,” the
violation of Philippine economic sovereignty by foreign business
giants, the sell-out of the national patrimony, unscrupulous
superprofit-taking by the US and other multinational firms,
debt bondage to the imperialist banks and bureaucratic corruption
of the Arroyo regime.
3.
Gross and systematic violations of the right to national self-determination
and liberation: Transgression of Philippine national sovereignty,
including treason by the Arroyo regime, all-out war policy
and use of state terrorism to keep the Arroyo puppet clique
in power and to align with the US global war of terror and
aggression, the culpability of the Arroyo regime and the US
for war crimes and crimes against humanity, the encroachment
on Philippine territory by US military interventionist forces
and surrender of jurisdiction to the US over criminal cases
in the Philippines.
The
last section of the third charge specifically alludes to the
Subic Rape case (mentioned earlier) in which the convicted
rapist, the American Daniel Smith, was forcibly and surreptitiously
removed from the Makati City Jail and transferred to the US
Embassy. Never in the entire history of US-Philippines relations
has any American military personnnel been tried in a Philippine
court for any offense such as rape, murder, and so on. As
proved many times in the past, even before any arrest could
be made by local authorities, the US would take charge of
the personnel accused of the crime and sneak him out of the
country.
The whole country was held in suspense during the seven-months
long trial of four American marines charged with the rape
of the 22-year-old Filipina. When the judge pronounced the
verdict last December, cries of jubilation rang out. But the
celebration was quickly aborted. What is scandalous in this
conjuncture of events may reveal a persistent logic of political
asymmetry: while the Filipino judge affirmed the jurisdiction
of Filipino courts over cases involving crimes committed in
the national territory, Arroyo’s Secretary of Justice
Raul Gonzales betrayed his trust by siding with the US Ambassador’s
claim of juridiction and defending this betrayal by appealing
to the VFA. In short, the Filipino official played the classic
role of dutiful subaltern to the neocolonial master, the global
hegemonic superpower. Such behavior distinguishes Arroyo’s
servility to the Bush administration and its militarist agenda,
including the unconscionable policies of liberalization, deregulation
and privatization imposed on impoverished debtor countries
like the Philippines.
So
we have arrived at this moment of judgment at The Hague. Not
only Arroyo is on trial, but also the US government, more
precisely the Bush administration and the corporate elite.
Noting the institutionalized inequality of agreements like
the VFA, Edre Olalia and Rachel Pastores, local members of
the International Association of People’s Lawyers (IALP),
denounced the “arrogance of US military forces all over
the world for vicious crimes like rape, but ultimately their
impunity for international crimes against humanity…
The US does this not only by refusing to be bound or by ignoring
international humanitarian law and useful mechanisms like
the International Criminal Court, but also foisting self-serving
bilateral agreements or twisting them to suit its purposes
of worldwide political, economic and military supremacy”
(from a flyer of the IALP dated Jan. 7, 2007).
Terms
of Engagement
Whether
such denunciations will amount to anything, whether the judgment
of the People’s Tribunal will translate into a feasible
program for action, remains to be seen. But the following
short interview of the world-renowned head of the NDFP, Luis
Jalandoni, might be useful in enlightening us on the historic
significance of the impending trial of the Arroyo regime before
the People’s Tribunal.
Since
the formation of the NDFP in 1972 as an umbrella group of
nationalist, progressive organizations (including the CPP
and the NPA), Jalandoni has been distinguished for his ecumenical
latitude of mind, fidelity to principles, and courageous perseverance.
He has sagaciously guided the NDFP through its ordeals in
the dark days of the Marcos regime, representing the NDFP
in peace talks with successive Philippine administrations
until the signing by both parties of the cornerstone of the
negotiations, the CARHRIHL (Comprehensive Agreement on Respect
for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law) on March
16, 1998. It is the first of four agreements in the substantive
agenda of the formal talks between the Philippine government
and the NDFP. Given the withdrawal of the Arroyo regime from
the talks, discussion of the other items in the agenda (socioeconomic
reforms, political and constitutional reforms, end of hostilities
and disposition of forces) has been postponed.
In
my opinion, Jalandoni remains one of the most highly esteemed
responsible leaders of the revolutionary movement of the poor,
exploited and oppressed masses of Filipinos in the Philippines
and around the world. His carefully formulated answers to
the key questions posed below may afford useful guideposts
for understanding the complex vicissitudes of the socialist
revolution spearheaded by the NDFP, especially in this time
of acute crisis but also of hitherto unseized opportunities
opening up in the course of the Filipino people’s centuries-old
struggle for genuine independence, social justice, and human
dignity.
Interview
with Luis Jalandoni
The
following interview by E. San Juan (ESJ) with Luis G. Jalandoni
(LGJ), Chairperson of the NDFP Negotiating Panel and member
of the NDFP National Executive Committee, was conducted through
the Internet on 15 February 15, 2007:
ESJ:
The upcoming People’s Tribunal session on the Arroyo
regime is a historic event comparable to the Tribunal on the
Marcos regime in 1980. Briefly, what do you think is the difference
between them? What is unique about this March session?
LGJ.
I think there are several differences. First, the legal people’s
organizations and alliances are far more developed and stronger
now. They are the complainants in this Second Session of the
PPT on the Philippines. In 1980, it was the NDF. Second, the
Marcos dictatorship then was not yet internationally isolated.
Now, the brazen brutality of the Arroyo regime has drawn international
condemnation of its human rights record. Such prestigious
international organizations as Amnesty International, the
World Council of Churches, the International Association of
Democratic Lawyers, The European Union, the United Nations
through Special Rapporteurs, and even the Foreign Chambers
of Commerce in the Philippines have come out with varying
degrees of condemnation and criticism. Third, the Tribunal
in 1980 was held in Antwerp, Belgium, while this coming Session
of the PPT will be in The Hague, the seat of international
law, the International Criminal Court, the International Court
of Justice and the venue of numerous international conventions
on human rights and international law.
What
is unique about this March session? A powerful array of witnesses,
experts and prosecutors from the Philippines will play a major
role. This surpasses the first session in 1980. The prosecutors,
led by UN Judge ad litem Romeo T. Capulong, have filed a compelling
indictment of the Arroyo regime, the US, the IMF, WB, WTO
and transnational corporations and banks doing business in
the Philippines.
ESJ:
What do you expect this Tribunal to accomplish in terms of
influencing the Arroyo government? Of influencing the international
response toward the national-democratic struggle in the Philippines?
LGJ:
The Tribunal will put the Arroyo government under the most
intense international pressure. The regime could go into further
deceptive measures like the futile Melo Commission and try
to get US and EU help. But the Bush regime is itself isolated
and less capable of providing assistance, much less than the
time of Marcos. Meanwhile, the EU asks for more transparency
before giving assistance. For example, the EU has demanded
a copy of the Melo Commission report, but the Arroyo government
refuses to make the report public.
Under
strong international pressure and to avoid deeper isolation
in the country, Mrs. Arroyo might yet seek a resumption of
peace negotiations with the NDFP, though this appears most
unlikely at the moment. She is expected to face greater resistance
from the people in the current year. Former President Joseph
Estrada, facing the danger of overthrow in December 2000,
tried to resume peace talks he had terminated and was about
to send an emissary to Utrecht, before he was overtaken by
events. It was too late. The following month, on January 20,
2001, he was overthrown by People Power II, with the AFP and
PNP commands withdrawing support from him.
The
Tribunal next March may help project more strongly on a wider
scale the recognition by significant forces in the international
community the justness of the national democratic struggle
in the Philippines. The just cause of the legal democratic
organizations and alliances will be powerfully projected,
with the inspiring courage of the victims and relatives of
victims of human rights violations. Furthermore, the just
cause for national and social liberation espoused by the underground
revolutionary movement can get better known, recognized and
supported internationally.
ESJ:
Given the increasing pressure on Arroyo from European governments
in the light of unprecedented human-rights violations, do
you see the possibility of the resumption of peace talks in
Norway soon?
LGJ:
The pressure from European governments has indeed been increasing,
but up to now the effect on Arroyo seems to be increased cosmetic
and deceptive moves and, on the ground, more draconian measures
like more killings and disappearances and the Anti-Terrorism
Bill. She still harbors the illusion of defeating the revolutionary
movement within a few years. So, there appears to be no prospect
for the resumption of peace talks in Norway soon.
ESJ:
The Hague Joint Declaration of 1992 is certainly invoked,
and evoked, by the choice of The Hague as the place for the
March Tribunal. You, as chief negotiator for the NDFP, are
to be credited with the major achievement of the peace negotiations,
the CARHRIHL. What is your assessment of the impact of the
CARHRIHL on, first, the European community, and, second, the
international public?
LGJ:
Indeed, the Tribunal in The Hague evokes the Hague Joint Declaration
of 1992 and the CARHRIHL which was signed in The Hague in
1998. Both are landmark agreements. The first enshrines the
principles of national sovereignty, social justice and democracy
as the guiding principles of the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations.
It also stipulates the principle of non-capitulation and the
four substantive agenda to address the roots of the armed
conflict.
CARHRIHL
is an agreement of the highest standard, bringing in the international
human rights and international humanitarian law conventions
as part of the evolving framework of the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations.
The most important international conventions such as the Geneva
Conventions and Protocols are adhered to by both Parties and
the concrete experience and conditions are set forth in the
agreement. The Hague Joint Declaration and the CARHRIHL shall
forever remain as very high standards for future peace negotiations
and essential guideposts for striving for a just and lasting
peace in the Philippines and elsewhere in the world.
I
think the impact of the CARHRIHL on the European community
and the international public is still relatively quite limited,
because it is not yet very widely known. However, the Norwegian
government is for the implementation of the CARHRIHL and supports
the work of the Joint Monitoring Committee created under this
agreement. Amnesty International has a high respect for this
agreement and takes it into account in advocating respect
for human rights in the Philippines and the resumption of
peace negotiations. A Spanish NGO which promotes HR and IHL
has translated the CARHRIHL and other GRP-NDFP peace documents
into Spanish, desiring that national liberation movements
in Latin America study it, make use of it and go into dialogue
with the NDFP.
The
NDFP-Joint Secretariat in Manila has published the GRP-NDFP
peace agreements, with the financial assistance of the Norwegian
government. These are widely disseminated to European and
other governments, political parties and alliances, and NGOs.
With the current increased interest of the EU and European
governments in the human rights situation in the Philippines,
the interest in the CARHRIHL will also increase.
The
credit for the CARHRIHL must go to both Parties that forged
it. The NDFP delegation played a crucial and key role in creatively
and painstakingly working out alternative formulations, standing
firmly on principle yet exercising flexibility on policy.
The whole delegation and all the organizations in the Philippines
which provided needed strength and backing deserve the credit.
Such towering persons like UN Judge ad litem and our Senior
Legal Adviser Romeo T. Capulong and Prof. Jose Maria Sison,
the NDFP Chief Political Consultant, played essential and
key roles as did the NDFP Reciprocal Working Committee on
Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law chaired by
Panel Member Fidel V. Agcaoili.
ESJ:
As far as I know, the Arroyo regime has shelved the CARHRIHL
and declared “total war” on the CPP and the NPA.
Quite symptomatically, it has not sought to categorize the
“NDFP” as a terrorist group. Is this a tactical
move to allow possible negotiations with the CPP/NPA?
LGJ:
Indeed, the Arroyo regime has shelved the CARHRIHL and declared
“total war” against the CPP and NPA . It has targeted
active progressive organizations and alliances as “Communist
fronts” and carried out the most brutal extra-judicial
killings, enforced disappearances, bombardments and shelling
which have displaced more than a million people, under Oplan
Bantay Laya from 2001-2006 and now under Oplan Bantay Laya
II starting 2007.
It
sought to categorize also the NDFP as “terrorist”.
Mrs. Arroyo sent then Foreign Secretary Blas Ople in September
2002 to persuade European governments to put the CPP, NPA,
and also the NDFP in the “terrorist” list. The
EU however refused to put the CPP on the list. One report
said that the Spanish government raised an objection to the
CPP being put on the list, because the Arroyo government was
negotiating with the CPP and the NDFP. Later in October 2005,
after the GRP had refused to negotiate with the NDFP, the
EU did put the CPP on the list. So, the Norwegian, Spanish
and other governments which may wish the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations
to resume may have that interest in mind in not putting the
NDFP on the list.
But
the Arroyo regime’s thrust seems to be to put the NDFP,
CPP and NPA on the “terrorist” list to pressure
the revolutionary movement to capitulate and to justify the
escalation of extra-judicial killings of leaders and members
of alleged “Communist fronts” and intensified
attacks on the suspected support base of the CPP and NPA in
the countryside.
ESJ:
What is your analysis of the effect of the Tribunal on the
coming May elections? (The Arroyo security advisers are scheming
to suppress the party-list groups, chiefly BAYAN MUNA.) Do
you see the Arroyo regime declaring martial law openly and
allowing more intervention by US forces (including Australian
units)?
LGJ:
The Tribunal may help cause the coming in of international
observers to the May elections. There will be greater international
attention and scrutiny on the elections.
It
appears that there may be no more time for the Arroyo regime
to secure the disqualification of BAYAN MUNA and other progressive
party lists. But even now there are reports of the regime’s
military openly threatening people not to vote for BAYAN MUNA
and other progressive party lists. The regime is also instructing
the military to promote anti-communist partylists such as
ANAD (Alliance for Nationalism and Democracy) and AKBAYAN.
Four progressive partylists, Bayan Muna, Anakpawis, Gabriela
Party list and Kabataan party list, have filed complaints
in court against the military in Negros, central Philippines,
for direct harassment and threats connected with the forthcoming
elections.
It
seems unlikely that Arroyo will declare martial law. The US
has indicated it is against such a move. And she would have
to overcome certain provisions in the current constitution,
and her Cha-Cha scheme has bogged down in the face of broad
Church opposition. It is more likely that she goes on with
the current de facto martial law, repressing the progressive
partylists and the bourgeois opposition, and cheat in the
elections to avoid impeachment in Congress. She is still trying
to push through an anti-terror bill which she can use to bludgeon
the opposition.
In
the meantime, she has allowed increasing US military intervention.
Agreements to allow Australian and other forces to also come
in have been announced and are being processed, using the
excuse of cooperation in the “war on terror” of
Bush.
ESJ:
What is your estimate of the possibility of the European Community
becoming independent of the Bush administration in the near
future and retracting its view of the CPP/NPA as “terrorist”
groups?
LGJ: There are growing rifts between the EU and the US. Germany
and France were against the US invasion of Iraq without UN
mandate. The most recent indication is the European Parliament’s
approval of a report condemning CIA rendition flights using
European airspace and airports. The report likewise strongly
criticized 13 member states for collaborating with the CIA
or “turning a blind eye” to the CIA rendition
flights. Other conflicts between the EU and the US came up
in the WTO regarding trade and subsidies.
But
in the main, the EU still cooperates with the US, as is clear
in the US-NATO collaboration in Afghanistan. There appears
to be continuing cooperation in the “terrorist”
listing of national liberation movements. Although the EU
is under pressure to demonstrate more transparency and respect
the rights to presumption of innocence, due process, and defense
in the process of listing and de-listing, it does not seem
likely that the EU in the near future would retract its view
of the CPP/NPA as “terrorist” groups.
ESJ:
Please give us your current appraisal of the gains and setbacks
of the national democratic movement in the Philippines since
the end of the Cold War, and from the perspective of 9/11
and the U.S.-led “global war on terrorism.”
LGJ:
The biggest setbacks of the national democratic movement were
due to the major errors of military adventurism, urban insurrectionism,
and the anti-infiltration hysteria in the mid-1980s until
1991 which caused the loss of 60% of the mass base. The rectification
movement, a mainly educational movement from 1992 onwards,
to identify, repudiate and rectify the errors, was a major
success. It has resulted in the consolidation and expansion
of the revolutionary movement. This has meant the strengthening
of the mass base, the reorientation of the New People’s
Army, the vigorous building of mass organizations and organs
of political power and carrying out of programs of land reform,
health, education and culture in wide areas of the countryside.
When
9/11 occurred and US President Bush declared his “war
on terror” and the Arroyo regime followed with Oplan
Bantay Laya, the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP),
the NPA and the NDFP had struck deep roots and was carrying
out the winning line of intensive and extensive guerrilla
warfare on the basis of an ever deepening and widening mass
base.
At
this time, the revolutionary movement has more than 120 guerrilla
fronts in more than 9,000 (out of about 42,000) barrios, covering
more than 800 (out of about 1600) municipalities in 70 out
of the 79 provinces in the Philippines. In these guerrilla
fronts, programs of land reform, livelihood improvement, health,
education, and culture are carried out by revolutionary mass
organizations of peasants, workers, women, and youth led by
local organs of political power.
ESJ:
Finally, what is your assessment of the Moro struggle and
the possibilities of closer NDF linkage with the Moro Islamic
Liberation Front and sections of the Moro National Liberation
Front that have refused the Misuari compromise with the neocolonial
state? Do you envision a future political united front despite
ideological differences?
LGJ:
We have always regarded the Moro people’s struggle as
a just struggle for national self-determination. There are
great possibilities for closer NDFP linkage and cooperation
with the MILF. There has been friendly cooperation between
the MILF and the NDFP for quite a number of years now. This
cooperation can certainly be further strengthened, in such
fields as defense of human rights, organizing of the masses,
mobilizations and other forms of cooperation of mutual benefit.
The possibilities of linkage and cooperation with sections
of the MNLF are increasing as the Moro masses influenced by
the MNLF resent US military intervention in their communities
and protest against the Arroyo regime’s subservience
to the US.
There
is already an alliance between the NDFP and the MILF. Such
alliance is also possible with sections of the MNLF. Hence,
there is already the beginning of a political united front
despite ideological differences. After all, in the NDFP, the
basis of unity is political. Also, the basis of the alliance
between the NDFP and other progressive or revolutionary forces
is or shall be likewise political. (Taken from: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/03/04/18372475.php)
__________________
*”Boondocks” is derived from the Tagalog word
for “mountains” (bundok), popularized by U.S.
troops pursuing the revolutionary army of the first Philippine
Republic during the brutal “pacification” campaign
in the Philippines from 1899 to 1913; about 4,000 Americans
and 1.4 million Filipinos died in this imperialist intervention
at the beginning of the 20th century.
