BIMBO CABIDOG
Even before Rody Duterte assumed office as 16th
president of the country, the peace talk with the reds was already in the
cards.
The question was: how will the challenge of this band of driven
men and women, who were not beholden to law or society and would stop at
nothing but the overthrow of the existing government, fall into place in a
Duterte dispensation?
It seemed at the beginning that Duterte, an outspoken Marcos
fan with also strongman tendencies, had the reds tucked in his pockets. The
Davao warlord has caught the latter off-guard by feigning affiliation with the
left and claiming to espouse socialist tenets.
So at first, romance blossomed between Duterte who smelled like
perfume fresh from winning the elections, and the old enemy of the ruling
classes he personified. The enemy was still waging an over-protracted warfare to
change the social order.
The Communist Party of the Philippines through its military wing,
the New People’s Army, has been conducting the armed struggle for nearly half a
century. In a new twist, college professor Jose Maria Sison, founder and former
chairman of the CPP, went for Duterte.
Sison, also known as Joma, has assigned himself the role of
adviser and chief consultant of the National Democratic Front in the peace
negotiations with the government. He is an iconic figure of the left who still
commands influence among revolutionary forces in the country.
A wily politico, Duterte strove to titillate Sison’s ego with his
allusion to the superiority of the virtual CPP head up to the present. He blurted
out that Joma was an idol of his, and
capped the massage with the impression of also heeding the words of his
erstwhile mentor in college.
Despite the glaring example of Davao, the left did not see through
or preferred to look away from Duterte’s fascist bent. The open and underground
groups that toed the CPP’s political line propped him glossing over his
unequivocal pronouncements of carrying on a bloody regime.
Why did the self-claimed vanguard of revolution that prides in being
guided by the concrete analysis of concrete conditions fall for the fakery of a
certified despot?
During the electoral campaign, Digong aired a conversation with
Joma in a live video call patch through Skype. It was a propaganda coup that sealed
two things. One was his image as a grassroots leader, who sides with the
oppressed and shares a lot of things with those fighting for them, like the
militant left.
Second was his portrait as a non-traditional politician, credible
even to the hardline critics of the status quo, who can be a great unifier as
he is in contact with the top honchos of the movement that is waging the
country’s long-running insurgency.
The public relations packaging gained for Digong a place of
respect and tacit admiration from the hardest (or impossible) to please progressive
elements who have persistently opposed the traditional political system as the
bastion of elite rule and betrayal of the people.
Another dramatic scene to gain traction with the public was of the
warlord mayor sleeping inside a mosquito net. No one cared to ask how a paparazzi
managed to slip inside his house and enter so private a sanctum as his room, to
take a photo while he curls up in a poor man’s doze.
The kulambo pictorial and Digong’s much talked-about contacts with
the reds sent the message of a leader having a heart for the downtrodden. They
easily convinced voters that he was the man to put the country to real change
For the usually skeptical left, he may just be the man whose
popular appeal is something to ride on or use to utmost advantage. The naïve
ones simply rooted for his slogan “change is coming,” not because they believed
in it, but because they believed in him.
Manifesting unorthodox political methods and a hard-core radical brand,
Duterte impressed as a devil-may-care hero with the iron will to strike at the oligarchs,
corrupt bureaucrats, shenanigans in public office and powerful crime lords.
Yet, the mayor who supposedly raised Davao into a modern urban
center shows to live simply. And he is simple enough to cut corners to get
results. He talks directly with the rebels. His ballyhooed trysts with personalities
of the extreme left are one for the charts. He was hands-down credible and believable.
The association of Joma’s circle with Duterte’s presidential
challenge helped in swaying a large segment of the electorate to bank on the
Davao warlord for peace and development. This would be one of the most telling
spins that clinched the 2016 vote for him.
To the conspiratorial forces that bear arms against the state,
Duterte for his mass appeal was harder to buck than to back. Sooner rather than
later, they just have to advance the prospect of settling for peace.
After all, he converses with Joma, honored the death of a New
People’s Army commander considered a pal, joined the kilometric funeral
procession for the rebel even as it waved subversive clichés right at the heart
of his city, and sorties alone to guerilla bases entrusting his life in the
hands of red fighters.
The well-known colorful episodes in the narrative of Digong’s
engagement with the reds would catch even hardliners tear up in pride and sense
of fulfillment. That he immediately wheeled into operation the peace initiative
with the CPP-NPA-NDF seemed to have vindicated support for his presidency.
For advance, he appointed known national democrats to the Cabinet:
Judy Taguiwalo – Secretary of the Department of Social Welfare and Development
(DSWD), Rafael Mariano – Secretary of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR),
Lisa Masa – National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC), and Terry Ridon –
Philippine Commission on the Urban Poor (PCUP).
They were joined by closet progressives Silvestre Bello to the
Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) and Gina Lopez to the Department of
Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). The latter were viewed to nurse
leftist precepts.
On the initiative of each, the government and CPP-NPA enunciated
ceasefires. The former also worked out the release of prized rebel captives,
like Benito and Wilma Tiamson, to get them to participate in the negotiations.
Several political prisoners walked out of detention with new roles as peace consultants.
Duterte has at a critical juncture of the country’s political
transitions succeeded in hoodwinking avowed nationalists and democrats to trust
in his patriotic and pro-people posturing. But more than a year later, the
progressive headways including the appointments of reds to the government would
be reversed.
Above all, the olive branch would prove a con. How easily Digong
shifted to derogating the reds and batting for their annihilation later. Have Joma
and his comrades been had by the Davao warlord?
In the wake of all the initial confidence building, the open ND
formations took to the streets not to denounce the evils of rule or hurl accusations
at government anymore, but to unfold streamers in support of just and lasting
peace. As armed hostilities in the battle fronts ceased, verbal hostilities in
the parliament-of-the-streets also quieted.
Very soon, the panels representing the belligerent parties of the
National Democratic Front of the Philippines or the NDFP, and the Government of
the Republic of the Philippines or the GRP faced each other across the table. No
few were moved by the stirring breakthrough.
Was peace finally at hand, notwithstanding the long and arduous
process that the negotiations for it will yet take? The succeeding period would
answer no.
Accusations, taunting and provocations by elements of the Armed
Forces of the Philippines and the NPA bedeviled the talks. The members of both
panels have barely warmed their seats when old animosities broke out again into
open warfare. Shooting encounters shattered the fragile ceasefires.
As clashes escalated taking increased casualties on the government
side, the old fascistic warlord could not hold any longer his legendary temper.
He ranted, cursed and shouted all-out war.
A while ago, Digong and Joma posed like lovey doves. Now they lunged
and hurled at each other. The brittle honeymoon between the two (it was from
the start anyway) ended in a verbal mix-up matching the resumption of armed
hostilities with a fiery exchange of ad hominens.
Before long, Duterte, visibly piqued, halted negotiations. The
dialogues convened twice and split twice in a span of one year. In both instances,
the talks proper did not bog down, the guns just sputtered. Digong would shelve
the process and vow to finish the insurgents for all time.
From how the mutually declared unilateral ceasefires easily turned
into mutual hostilities, it came out that both parties were not really serious
about the goal of peace. They seemed more engrossed with playing games for
selfish political gain.
The shrift by both parties to the tactic of vying for propaganda
edge through brinkmanship in the negotiation rendered the peace endeavor meaningless.
They were not after sharing the ultimate end of silencing the guns. They were
pulling at each for one or the other to follow.
For the left, it may just be the one last chance to beat out of a
fruitless war without swallowing pride or losing relevance. For Duterte, it may
yet hide the fact that he is just a trying-hard third-rate Marcos copycat with
populist pretensions.
The final question is: should peace for 105 million Filipinos be merely
up to them who seem not to be in the position to give it solid chance?
