Cordillera People's Democratic Front:
Distinct Front of the Cordillera People

Basahin ang artikulong ito sa Pilipino

The conference of the Ilocos-Cordillera merged region held last July further clarified and ratified the nature and organization of the Cordillera People's Democratic Front (CPDF). The conference resolved whatever ambiguity and indecision remained regarding the character of the CPDF as an alliance and established its relationship with organs of political power and mass organizations, especially among the ranks of the minority peoples.

Minority peoples as a special group were among the major points considered. Regional issues could not be regarded separately from their struggle for self-determination. Minority peoples are composed of different classes and sectors. Some of them belong to the ruling classes. But the majority, comprising the various democratic classes, are oppressed and exploited.

The struggle of the minority peoples against national oppression is advanced, primarily within the framework of the revolutionary and democratic front. Meanwhile, the struggle of each democratic class is advanced and upheld, primarily within the framework of the revolutionary mass organizations.

The poor, lower-middle and middle peasants of the Cordillera comprise the biggest sector in the region. Their revolutionary mass organization is the largest one within the democratic front. This organization will encompass peasants from the "interior" part of the Cordillera who advance the anti-feudal struggle in a form and expression particular to the area.*

Resolutions

The conference resolved that the CPDF is a revolutionary front that carries and applies the line of people's democratic revolution in the Cordillera. The minority peoples' struggle for self-determination is merged with the Filipino people's struggle for national democracy. In the program for a people's democratic revolution, this is expressed through the recognition of regional autonomy under the central people's democratic government.

This front will be composed of the revolutionary mass organizations of the basic revolutionary forces in the Cordillera (majority of whom are minority peoples but also including non-minorities). It is a territorial front that encompasses the entire region.

The CPDF will serve as the regional formation of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) in the Cordillera. Like the NDFP, it is consultative, conferencial and consensual in nature. Likewise, it will recognize the independence and initiative of each allied organization.

Sections of national revolutionary mass organizations in the region will join the CPDF, and so with the Party and the New People's Army in the Cordillera.

The CPDF will assist in setting up organs of political power. Like the NDFP inside the guerrilla fronts, it shall be distinguished from the seeds of the provisional revolutionary government in the region.

Aside from the CPDF, other regional organizations may be formed within the Cordillera. Likewise, the arena is open for setting up territorial formations of the CPDF lower than the regional level.

The conference also resolved that the first CPDF congress held in March 1989 was legitimate. While it was launched at a time when the revolutionary movement in general was suffering from disorientation, it upheld the Party's leadership, the socialist perspective and the two-stage revolution. All that is needed is to revise the constitution and program of the CPDF to reflect its defined character and its reaffirmation of its basic revolutionary principles.

*This refers to the indigenous farmers in the Cordillera mountains. Agricultural production in these areas is very backward and underdeveloped. The indigenous farmers are currently suffering from intense dislocation and militarization brought about by widespread landgrabbing of ancestral lands by the state and foreign corporations.

00 October 1998
English Edition

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