May 10 elections offer no hope to the Filipino people

Gregorio "Ka Roger" Rosal
Spokesperson
Communist Party of the Philippines
May 06, 2004

Like all other reactionary elections in the history of the puppet republic, the coming polls on May 10 serve only to perpetuate the ruling political system and create an illusion of democracy. These elections can neither express the will of the people nor be the means of selecting leaders that will truly represent the people's interests.

It is the prevailing socio-economic, political, electoral and cultural system that dictates the predominance of reactionary parties and candidates in reactionary elections. As before, the May 10 polls will largely redound to determining which political agent and faction of the reactionary ruling classes would gain ascendancy and benefit from the spoils of power in exchange for performing their role as caretaker of the reactionary state and perpetuating the oppression and exploitation of the people.

Although candidates for the various elective posts in the reactionary government compete against one another by engaging in populist and reformist demagoguery, feudal patronage, advertising and media gimmicks and other pretensions in order to win the votes of the people, what most decisively determines the outcome of the elections is the use of guns, goons and gold. The various candidates' command over both their own as well as the state's instruments for coercion and persuasion, their access to huge campaign money and massive resources especially from the government, the wherewithal to engage in vote-buying and the capacity to manipulate the vote count have always characterized reactionary elections in the country and have determined their outcome.

The prevailing system and given conditions reserve the highest positions and the majority of seats for the representatives of the ruling classes and allows just a few progressive parties and candidates to win seats in the elections. Progressive parties and candidates face tremendous odds and are systemically marginalized from the very start.

The fact that the party-list law allocates only 20% of congressional seats for party-list organizations that are not among the five biggest political parties already attests to the exclusionary character of reactionary elections. Worse, most of those competing for such a limited number of seats do not actually represent the marginalized sectors of society and are actually extensions of various vested interests and factions of the reactionary ruling classes.

More damning is the fact that the reactionary armed forces and other rabid fascists readily launch vicious and violent attacks against progressive parties and candidates, especially during times when progressives begin to register a significant presence in the reactionary elections. This has been the case throughout the more than half a century's existence of the puppet republic.

In the 1987 elections, it was the progressive Partido ng Bayan that suffered the biggest number of deaths, injuries and harassment. In the current polls, it is progressive party-list organizations like Bayan Muna, Anakpawis and Anak ng Bayan that are bearing the brunt of the murders and mayhem perpetrated mostly by the military and other diehard fascist forces.

This campaign of violence is currently being waged by the clerico-fascist National Security Adviser and US intelligence agent Norberto Gonzales in collaboration with the AFP leadership and other fascists.

They barefacedly violate the rights of legal democratic organizations and parties. The wanton violence and acts of fascist repression make it ever more difficult for the progressives to participate in the parliamentary arena.

It is to the progressives' credit that they are able to succeed and persevere in the arena of electoral struggle despite the tremendous odds against them. The Filipino people can benefit from their presence in the reactionary parliament and other positions in the reactionary government. By exposing the rottenness of the system and championing the national and democratic rights of the people, they help raise the people's consciousness and militancy.

The fundamental task of the Communist Party of the Philippines in regard to elections under the prevailing ruling system is to expose the farcity of reactionary elections and the reactionary political system and point out the need for revolutionary struggle in order to uproot the fundamental problems of the people.

At the same time, the Party extends its united front policy to the electoral arena. It seeks alliances with progressives and takes advantage of the heightened contradictions among the reactionaries during elections and in the aftermath in order to achieve gains for the revolutionary movement.

The permit-to-campaign policy also stems from this united front policy as well as the need to assert the exercise of revolutionary political power and ascertain the protection and promotion of the interests of the revolutionary mass base and mass movement.

On the whole, the upcoming May 10 elections offer no hope to the Filipino people and will not resolve their deep-seated socio-economic and political problems. The polls cannot be expected to beget fundamental changes for the better in the basic conditions of Philippine society. They cannot wrest the country free from the stranglehold of the crisis-ridden semicolonial and semifeudal system.

Only by waging a protracted people's war and engaging in revolutionary armed struggle as the principal form of struggle can the people overthrow the rotten neocolonial and semifeudal order and establish a new revolutionary order of national freedom, democracy, lasting peace and progress. #

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