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[FOREWORD] The year 2020 confronted the Party and revolutionary movement with a myriad of challenges. While the Covid-19 pandemic raged across the world, the US-Duterte regime unleashed an intensified dirty war against the people, campaign of suppression against democratic rights and all-out armed offensive and relentless bombardment in the countryside.

It is helpful to look back at 2020 to gain a clearer view of what to face in the coming year. It is the task of revolutionary forces to study the past to identify the trends and main currents of history.

Ang Bayan (AB) is issuing this “Editorial 2020,” a collection of editorials published by AB during 2020 as an aid for studying the past. As AB comes out every fortnight, its editorials reflect the overall picture of the situation in the Philippines and the Filipino people at each period.

One will read in this collection the main issues which the country faced in 2020 and the calls which the Party issued to the people.

The first and last AB editorial in 2020 touched on the call for further strengthening the antifeudal struggles and the peasant resistance in the countryside against the attacks of Duterte’s armed minions. These pointed out the key importance of advancing the antifeudal movement in the overall strengthening of the people’s war, and particularly in fighting state terrorism under the US-Duterte fascist regime.

The major topic discussed in the most numerous editorials (7 of 24) during the last year was the Covid-19 pandemic. One can see how, from the outset, the Party denounced the US-Duterte regime for its slow response and neglect in the face of the spread of the virus in the country. Early on, the Party called for a democratic movement of the entire people as the response to the pandemic.

One can also read from these editorials the Party’s analysis of the anti-democratic nature of Duterte’s initial response to the pandemic, and how he took advantage of the health crisis to advance his fascist agenda. AB’s editorials denounced the extension of lockdowns while no measures were being carried out to fix the health system and provide assistance to the people severely oppressed by the economic shutdown.

Fascism or state terrorism was the next most discussed topic in the editorials (4) in 2020. This mainly discussed the successive murders of activists and mass leaders, the railroading of the Anti-Terror Law in July, the brazen red-tagging and fascist attacks against the right to expression and other democratic rights.

The editorials of AB consistently urged the people to fight for their rights and take action to resist amid the pandemic, economic crisis, intensified fascist attacks and schemes to perpetuate the Duterte dynasty. It is only through collective resistance could the people avoid being paralyzed by the spread of the disease or crushed by the regime’s state terrorism.

Through AB’s editorials, the Party aims to unite all revolutionary forces and lead them in arousing, organizing and mobilizing the Filipino people.

We invite everyone to read back through AB’s editorials of 2020 as a way of looking back into the issues that confronted the Filipino people and how these are understood from the class standpoint of the Party. Use this collection as a reference and guide for continuing revolutionary work in the future.