Central Committee, Communist Party of the Philippines
July 1992

On the Issue of Peace Negotiations

Proposals for peace talks and national unity between the revolutionary forces and a new government to replace the Marcos regime were publicly aired by the prominent leaders and forces in alliance against the fascist regime in the 1983-86 period. These proposals served to expand and firm up the united front, both formal and informal. Upon coming to power, Aquino released the political prisoners as she had pledged to do in an attempt to court the support of the national democratic movement; and called for a ceasefire as she had expressed interest in it before becoming president.

Sa pagluklok niya sa kapangyarihan, si Aquino ay nagpalaya ng mga bilanggong pulitikal tulad ng kanyang ipinangako sa pagsisikap na kunin ang suporta ng pambansa-demokratikong kilusan; at nanawagan ng isang tigil-putukan tulad ng ipinahayag niyang interes dito bago pa man siya naging presidente.

It was correct for the Party to declare its willingness to engage in peace talks or, as the Aquino regime preferred to call them, ceasefire talks. To have done otherwise would have been to appear as being opposed to peace in the face of Aquino's offer of ceasefire talks. In the first place, the Party's national democratic line is the line for a just and lasting peace. Thus, it was decided that a negotiating panel of the National Democratic Front would represent all the revolutionary forces.

But before agreeing to engage in formal bilateral negotiations or sign a ceasefire agreement, the NDF should have taken all the time to engage in talks about peace talks until such time that a substantive agenda and other terms could be agreed upon to the mutual satisfaction of the two sides. Even before the 60-day ceasefire agreement, the NDF could take initiatives in launching propaganda. It could also expose the other side as the intransigent one, especially on the substantive issues. The NDF could rebuff the other side every time this threatened to end the preceasefire talks.

It was erroneous though to allow the preceasefire talks to be held exclusively in the Metro Manila area. The sickness (terminal cancer) of one of the negotiators of the reactionary government, Senator Jose W. Diokno who was deeply respected by the NDF, dictated the constant Metro Manila venue of the preceasefire talks. It was also erroneous to agree to a 60-day ceasefire agreement without any agreement on a substantive agenda for serious peace negotiations. The declared purpose of the ceasefire agreement was merely for creating the atmosphere for an undefined substantive dialogue during the ceasefire period.

One reason given for the ceasefire agreement was that it would pave the way for a substantive agenda and for the formal peace talks. Another reason given by some elements in the Party for the ceasefire agreement was that it would allow the revolutionary forces to show their "human face" and to make propaganda on a nationwide scale through the dominant bourgeois mass media.

Still another reason given by other elements in the Party was that the people's army in Mindanao needed the ceasefire as a relief from the pressures by overwhelming enemy military forces and as a device for allowing supplies to isolated and besieged NPA units. Actually, the enemy forces in Mindanao were then in disarray due to the big split between the Marcos-Ver and the Enrile-Ramos camps. At any rate, some Mindanao cadres had gone into localized ceasefire independent of the central leadership of the Party. They were in a difficult situation not simply because of enemy pressures but more essentially because of the ravages of a wrong line and the anti-informer hysteria.

Some elements in the Mindanao Commission had the localist notion that they could run far ahead of the rest of the country in liberating Mindanao through a combination of offensives by enlarged "regularized" NPA formations and armed urban uprisings. Under conditions of self-destruction as a result of the anti-informer hysteria and the effectiveness of the enemy in a purely military situation, they wished to find a way out through localized ceasefire, without realizing that these could induce a fragmentation of the national revolutionary movement and that these would not really solve the problems wrought by the erroneous line that they had pushed in Mindanao. At any rate, there was a case of swinging from an ultra-Left to a Rightist position.

Certain leading cadres of the Party held the view that our armed struggle was put in a politically defensive position after the EDSA uprising. They asserted that we needed the ceasefire to "reposition" our armed struggle in the new situation. For them, the ceasefire was the main thing and it was a good thing that served our purpose despite the serious flaws in the ceasefire agreement and the aggravation of our security problems in the cities and the countryside.

There were even a few who held the view that the ceasefire and peace talks would possibly lead to another polarization of forces where Aquino and other "middle forces" (including pro-Aquino comprador big bourgeois and landlords) could be won over to the side of the revolutionary forces against the U.S., the AFP and other diehard reactionaries all of whom were supposedly against the ceasefire.

In the course of the pre-ceasefire talks, the NDF negotiators were vulnerable to enemy surveillance. It was quite easy for the enemy intelligence agencies to cover the negotiators of the reactionary government and to follow the trail of those of the NDF. During the pre-ceasefire talks, no less than a member of the Executive Committee of the Central Committee was arrested.

During the ceasefire period, the NDF negotiating panel and the NDF representatives were able to conduct mass activities, demonstrating the popular support and sympathy for the NDF. But in the process, some underground cadres, Red fighters, reliable allies and certain reliable villages and other areas were exposed to the intelligence agencies of the enemy.

The NDF got more than the usual amount of attention that it had gotten before in the bourgeois mass media. But after two weeks, the civil and military officials of the reactionary government were getting far more space and were getting their kind of message through more strongly.

As the NDF negotiating panel demanded that substantive talks be undertaken, it became much more obvious that the new pro-U.S. reactionary government was interested only in a ceasefire for the following reasons:

1. to gain time for putting the reactionary armed forces in order because of the big split between the pro-Marcos and the anti-Marcos camps;

2. to pretend as a champion of democracy, human rights and peace;

3. to demand the submission of the revolutionary forces to the constitution of the reactionary government and the surrender of the New People's Army in exchange for the promise of general amnesty and rehabilitation;

4. to put a stop to the momentum of the armed revolution and possibly split the revolutionary forces; and

5. to increase the surveillance stocks of the intelligence services.

The upsurge of the antifascist movement and the decline of the Marcos regime in the 1983-86 period had induced Party cadres, who were on the enemy manhunt list but who belonged to the urban-based central organs, to become lax with their security. The ceasefire induced among them more carelessness and laxity which continued even after the breakdown of the ceasefire. The enemy reaped a bonanza of intelligence data. On March 29, 1988, the enemy forces started to carry out precision raids on the houses of central organs. They captured officials of the Party, of the NPA general command, documents, equipment and money. They proceeded to raid underground houses used by the NDF and capture other underground personnel and stocks of documents within the same year.

In that same period, there was a widespread sense of danger among the leading Party cadres about what had been supposed as a "network of enemy deep penetration agents". There had been an acceptance _ at face value and without much analysis _ of the conclusions of the Ahos campaign about the supposed uncovering in Mindanao and probably several other regions of longstanding and large-scale "enemy deep penetration networks". The new raids and arrests came on top of an alert against the enemy's infiltration scheme. And then there had been an acute sense of danger as a result of the successful enemy raids and the growing damage inflicted by successful enemy attacks, whose internal bases and causes were not comprehensively and deeply analyzed and the immediate causes of many of these had not been firmed up. As a result, a sense of panic easily arose among some members of the Central Committee and a number of regional committees in 1988; and claims of a "breakthrough" in investigations were readily believed. Thus, the anti-informer hysteria emerged in several regions, especially Metro Manila and Southern Tagalog, and in some central staff organs, and this claimed scores of victims. The hysteria threatened the very life of the Party. For a time, the central leadership of the Party itself became involved in the campaign in Metro Manila, until it conducted its own direct investigation, realized the grave mistakes, and took firm steps to check and rectify the madness with clear guidelines on correct principles and methods of investigation, trial and evaluation of evidence.

It must be noted at this point that the anti-infiltrator hysteria can arise from effective enemy blows due either to a previous ultra-Left error or a Rightist error. To guard against further recurrence of this hysteria, the central leadership of the Party has issued the principles and methods of investigation, trial and evaluation of evidence since November 1988. These serve to strengthen the guarantees of civil rights that are in the Bill of Rights of the Rules for Establishing the People's Government and the guarantees of due process in the Constitution of the Party and the Rules of the New People's Army. A thoroughgoing review of all the anti-infiltration campaigns, including the first campaign conducted in the Quezon-Bicol Border Area, has been ordered. The Party leadership has also issued comprehensive guidelines and detailed instructions on security since 1989.

As a result of some efforts to push a new round of peace talks between the NDF and the reactionary government from 1989 onward, the Party and the NDF have further worked out a comprehensive framework of peace negotiations in order to frustrate the attempt of the enemy to misrepresent itself as the champion of peace and the revolutionary forces as the source of violence and to split the revolutionary forces and the people. The main points in the framework are the following:

1. The strategic line is one of pursuing the national democratic line to attain a just and lasting peace.

2. The NDF is a belligerent force in the civil war and not a mere insurgent force. It cannot negotiate with the reactionary government if not on an equal footing under international law.

3. The legal and political frame is the set of mutually acceptable principles, the international norms and the agreements that may be made.

4. The substantive agenda includes the following: respect for human rights and international humanitarian law; social and economic reforms; constitutional, political and electoral reforms; and the armed forces.

5. There must be a reasonable timetable.

6. The venue must be abroad for the mutual convenience and safety of the two sides.

7. There must be a foreign state or interstate third party acting in a certain capacity (intermediary, good offices or witness) agreed upon by the two sides.

8. The domestic and foreign third party of nongovernmental peace advocates can be consulted and be of help to the peace process.

The framework of the reactionary government is diametrically opposed to that of the NDF and is not at all a framework for peace negotiations but for killing the peace process ab initio. It includes the following points:

1. NDF must submit to the GRP constitution.

2. The NPA must surrender its arms and be liquidated.

3. In exchange for the foregoing two points, the GRP will offer amnesty and rehabilitation measures to the amnesty grantees.

4. Negotiations must be held in the Philippines.

5. If the NDF leadership refuses to agree to the foregoing points, then the GRP and AFP will not enter into any formal bilateral talks with the NDF but will seek localized dialogues and ceasefire for the surrender of local leaders and forces of the CPP, NPA and NDF.

The opposing frameworks are absolutely clear. Those who blame the Party and other revolutionary forces for the absence of formal bilateral talks between the NDF and GRP cause harm to the interests of the revolutionary movement. Those who take the posture of being above the NDF and the GRP, avowing to be simply interested in doing away with the human costs of the civil war, and who simplistically consider both sides of the civil war as equally violent, actually obscure the just and reasonable cause of the armed revolution and in effect rationalize the retention of the violent system of oppression and exploitation.

We must rebuff those elements who, without understanding the costs of prolonged ceasefire to the revolutionary will and forces of the people, exaggerate the importance of ceasefire and peace talks as means to broaden the united front and strengthen the mass movement for the purpose of an armed urban insurrection.

We must frustrate the reactionary effort to put the NDF at par with mutinous factions of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and with a multiplicity of nongovernmental organizations of all political sorts (including the most reactionary ones) in a supposed peace process to attain a broad anti-imperialist front for an "armed insurrection in the medium term". This is a puerile ploy.

We must also frustrate the attempt of some reactionary clerical elements to make the revolutionary movement accept the strategic hamlet by a simple change of name, like "zone of peace" or "zone of life". Our revolutionary mass base is peaceful and full of productive life, unless the reactionary forces intrude and unleash death and destruction on it.

We must put a stop to the practice of NDF cadres on the enemy manhunt list going to Manila to meet with personalities under probable or certain surveillance and to talk about peace prospects with them there. The repeatedly proven cost of such meetings should convince everyone that talks about peace talks are best delegated to those who are most secure or least vulnerable.

Dapat ipatigil ang pagpunta-punta sa Maynila ng mga kadre ng NDF na nasa listahan ng hinahanap ng kaaway, para makipagtagpo sa mga personalidad na malamang o tiyak na minamanmanan at doo'y makipag-usap sa mga ito tungkol sa posibilidad ng kapayapaan. Ang paulit-ulit na napatutunayang kabayaran ng ganitong mga pakikipagtagpo ay dapat makakumbinse sa lahat na ang mga pag-uusap tungkol sa mga pag-uusap pangkapayapaan ay pinakamahusay nang ipaubaya sa mga nasa kalagayang pinakaligtas o hindi bulnerable sa lahat.

On the question of peace negotiations, we must reject any ultra-Left and yet Rightist notion that if armed urban insurrection is not possible, then we must seek peaceful settlement with the enemy and depart from the armed revolution and put our hopes on parliamentarism. We must also reject as a major premise of peace negotiations the notion that the NDF must seek peaceful settlement because it is supposed to be the trend in the world. A just peace in the Philippines is essentially something that the Filipino people have to fight for.

If there can be no peace negotiations yet, it is because the reactionary government is intransigent. The lack of peace negotiations only means that the revolutionary forces and the people under the leadership of the Party must work and fight more resolutely than ever to change the balance of forces in the Philippines.