By Prof. Jose Maria Sison
Chief Political Consultant
National Democratic Front of the Philippines
7 March 2007
If the targets were only Al Qaeda, Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah, the laws on murder, kidnapping, arson, robbery and the like in the criminal code of the Philippine reactionary government would have sufficed. But the real objective of the Arroyo regime in enacting the Anti-Terror Law is to use it for carrying out martial rule without having to proclaim it and without having to comply with the requirements set by the 1987 constitution.
The regime is hell bent on escalating the fascist campaign to suppress the revolutionary movement as well as the broad range of legal opposition forces and critics.
It is a foregone conclusion that the Anti-Terrorism Council will push the proscription of the Communist Party of the Philippines, the New People’s Army and directly or indirectly the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) and prevent the resumption of the peace negotiations between the Philippine reactionary government and the NDFP at least for the duration of the Arroyo regime.
The Arroyo regime is set on engaging in massive fraud and terrorism in the 2007 elections and using the Anti-Terror Law to preempt the broad masses of the people, the progressive forces and the broad opposition forces from protesting and opposing such a colossal crime, which is now on stream for the political survival of the regime..
But the Arroyo regime is fooling itself by presuming that it can use the Anti-Terror Law to terrorize and suppress the revolutionary movement, all the legal democratic forces and the broad opposition.
Even before the signing of the Anti-Terror Law, the Arroyo regime has perpetrated massive extrajudicial killings, abductions, torture, illegal detention and forced mass evacuation of people from their homes and farms. But the people, the revolutionary forces and the legal opposition have persevered, fought back and grown in strength.
In the past, the Anti-Subversion Law of 1957, which threatened to put to death the officers of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its supposed front and successor organizations, failed to stop the reestablishment of the CPP and the resurgence of the anti-imperialist and antifeudal mass movement.
The Marcos regime, with its 14-year outright martial law and fascist dictatorship, failed to suppress what was then a fledgling Communist Party and revolutionary mass movement. Instead, it generated the conditions for the growth and advance of the CPP, the NPA and the NDFP, despite the murder of thousands, the arbitrary detention and torture of tens of thousands and displacement of millions of people.
With the Anti-Terror Law, the Arroyo regime will surely exacerbate the oppression and exploitation of the people, rapidly polarize the situation and incite the broad masses of the people, the revolutionary forces and the legal democratic forces to rise up and topple the Arroyo regime. ###
