Filipino communists have vowed to overthrow “the US-Duterte regime and its rule of fascist terror” to mark its 50th anniversary.
The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) Central Committee released its ambitions for its half century today (Friday, December 29).
It said its number-one goal for 2018 was to “build the broadest united front” to overthrow what it describes as the US-Duterte regime.
Its statement continued: “The Filipino people are suffering gravely under the Duterte regime. The entire Party and all revolutionary forces must exert vigorous efforts to unite the Filipino people in a broad united front to resist and overthrow the fascist Duterte regime as they did the Marcos dictatorship and the Estrada regime.”
The party then listed the war drugs, martial law in Mindanao and alleged attacks against minorities as the foremost crimes of the so-called US-Duterte regime.
The CPP also alleged there were “unmistakable indications that Duterte’s death squads have grown bigger and have been deployed nationwide and embedded within the police and military organisations”.
The statement continued: “Duterte is obsessed with imposing a military and police approach to suppress the mounting clamour for fundamental social change amid the seething socio-economic problems besetting the Filipino people.
“He made a complete turnaround from his earlier declaration of being a socialist and ‘the first Leftist president’ in the country. He has totally reneged on his promised sweeping reforms and uplifting the lives of the impoverished masses.”
The president had previously endeared himself to the Left when he released a number of its imprisoned leaders and focussed on resuming long-stalled peace talks.
However, these negotiations have fallen apart, amid acrimony on both sides. Now, the president has begun the formal process of declaring the CPP and its armed wing, the New People’s Army, as terrorist organisations.
The CPP statement said: “The resort to terror tagging is a futile attempt to discredit and attack the Filipino people’s revolutionary forces and their age-long aspiration for national freedom and social justice. It also aims to cover-up the state-sponsored terrorism wreaking havoc on the lives and livelihood of the people.
“Duterte’s vicious attacks against the Party and the national democratic forces aim to consolidate the support of the US government and AFP for his tyrannical rule. It serves his strongman ambitions of establishing a fascist dictatorship.
“This system is characterised by complete lack of national freedom, economic backwardness, ever worsening forms of exploitation and oppression and all-pervasive bureaucratic corruption under the rule of reactionary classes of big compradors and landlords. All the worst facets of the semi-colonial and semi-feudal system have deteriorated over the course of more than 70 years.”
For his part, President Duterte has made his own vow to defeat the communists over the course of the coming year.