NPA insurgency gone by 2016 – military

THE Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) is optimistic that the decades-old communist insurgency in the country will be defeated before the end of the six-year term of the Aquino administration in 2016.

The chief of the AFP Public Affairs Office (PAO), Lt. Col. Arnulfo Marcelo Burgos, on Monday claimed that many members of the New People’s Army (NPA), the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines and the National Democratic Frong (CPP-NDF), have expressed their desire to leave the underground movement and return to mainstream society.

According to Burgos, this wish was evident in two separate incidents in Mindoro Occidental and Cagayan de Oro City wherein NPA rebels said that they will surrender after the 18-day suspension of offensive military operations (SOMO) against the CPP-NPA that took effect on December 16.

“There are many [NPA members] who want to surrender,” he said, adding that a “mass surrender” could have taken place if not for opposition from NPA leaders on the ground.

Recently, an NPA leader and eight of his troops operating in Cagayan de Oro City in Misamis Oriental province in southern Mindanao turned themselves in to Mayor Vicente Umano along with their high-caliber firearms, including an M60 machine gun.

Burgos said that attempts from other NPA rebels to return to the folds of the law have been foiled by their comrades.

In Mindoro Occidental in Southern Luzon, he added, some NPA members were on their way for a pre-arranged surrender before the commander of the 80th Infantry Battalion, Lt. Col. Roger Percol, when other members of the rebel group fired upon the military men waiting, forcing the soldiers to take combat position and the surrenderees to withdraw.

The incident, though, did not prevent an NPA member from surrendering and turning over his high-powered firearm to government troops.

“The AFP calls on the New People’s Army rebels to allow their comrades who wish to return to the folds of the law to have the opportunity for a better, normal life different from their lives in the mountains,” Burgos said.

Earlier, the AFP spokesman, Brig. Gen. Jose Mabanta Jr., said that they firmly believe that the leadership of the CPP-NPA is bent on pursuing negotiated peace talks to finally put an end to the 40-year-old communist insurgency.

The problem, he added, are the loose NPA organizations on the ground, which the higher CPP leadership at times could not control.

Starting January 2011, the military would start to implement its new anti-insurgency campaign dubbed as “Internal Peace and Security Plan (IPSP) Bayanihan,” which it hopes would finally convince the NPA guerrillas to lay down their arms and go back to normal lives.

The IPSP Bayanihan is anchored on four specific elements: governance, delivery of basic services, economic reconstruction and sustainable development and security-sector reform.

Mabanta said that the new strategy deviates from the traditional search-and-destroy operations and focuses instead on civil-military campaign.

In implementing the new strategy, the AFP will be guided by two equally important strategic imperatives:
adherence to human rights/international humanitarian law and the rule of law and the involvement of all stakeholders in the peace process.

In its 2009 year-end report, it also claimed that the previous strategy, “Oplan Bantay Laya,” was instrumental in the steady decline of the CPP-NPA and improved business confidence in the country.

In 2002, the military said, there were 1,969 barangays (villages) affected by the CPP-NPA, a number that increased to 12,510 in 2004 but went down to 2,115 by end 2006.

It added that in January 2002, there were some 12,000 CPP-NPA members, 7,100 by end 2006 and 4,642 by end of the first quarter of 2010. –WILLIAM B. DEPASUPIL REPORTER, Manila Times