Comrades,

Anti-Imperialist Action Ireland congratulates the Communist Party of the Philippines and all of the brave anti-imperialists of the National Democratic revolution on the occasion of the party’s 55th anniversary. We respect the Communist Party of the Philippines as an upstanding example of the best of the communist and anti-imperialist tradition, who wage people’s war against British and Yankee imperialism. This important date marks 55 years of the new life given to the party by its First Great Rectification Movement led by Jose Maria Sison in 1968. These original rectifiers led the reborn party into an intense guerrilla struggle for liberation by building the New People’s Army. Starting with only a small guerrilla band and a handful of old weapons, the people’s army now operates nationwide with thousands of highly-trained full time fighters, organising militias of even larger numbers. In 1992, capitulationism and factionalism crept up on the Communist Party of the Philippines as it had in the national liberation war in Ireland at the time. Through the work spearheaded by Benito and Wilma Tiamzon, the Second Great Rectification Movement, during the end of the Cold War and the “end of history”, shattered the defeatism of the decade and sustained the National Democratic revolution to reach new heights. Jose Maria Sison passed away peacefully last year, while this year, the Tiamzons were abducted and brutally assassinated by the Armed Forces of the Philippines. However, their legacy will carry on through the third Rectification Movement which has been called by the leadership of the 150,000-strong party today.

On this monumental occasion we as Irish socialist republicans salute the Communist Party of the Philippines for its legendary endurance, resolve, and initiative. By organising a broad, anti-imperialist front through the National Democratic Front and wider movement, the party is uniting huge sections of the Filipino population in common struggle against imperialist plunder. If one looks at the Philippines and compares its rich natural resources to the shocking conditions of its people, then there can be no wonder as to why such a revolutionary war exists. The Philippines, railroaded by compradors, gangsters, and bootlickers of imperialist investors, is a nation where children grow up in the mediaeval horror of tin shantytowns while skyscrapers soar above them, and where a thing of Ireland’s dark history, the tenant farming system, is not a historical horror but an everyday reality. The imperialists complain of the “terrorism” of the New People’s Army while condemning thousands of Filipinos to die as a result of these conditions. In the eyes of Irish republicans, ever since Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, the Filipino National Democratic revolution, in which the CPP plays a key role, is a heroic rebellion against foreign-owned sweatshops and pit mines waged against a regime propped up by the same Crown Forces and Yankee military that illegally occupy our country. Imperialism is stripping and gutting the Philippines. The need for a revolutionary upheaval by the incorruptible inheritors of the Philippines’ future rings especially true for Filipino workers and peasants, and the women, lumads, and LGBT people among them for whom the CPP has championed the struggles of.

The CPP is celebrating its 55th anniversary under its annual seasonal ceasefire, which the Armed Forces are psychopathically now claiming to have intentionally violated. We wish the party well in its celebrations today, and in the bold new step it has taken towards its future and the future of the entire National Democratic revolution through its Third Rectification Movement, which will see a new generation of trailblazers and revolutionaries emerge from the honourable ranks of the Filipino nation. We have faith in the cadres and leaders of the CPP and are proud to witness another important chapter of Filipino and revolutionary history unfold.

Le meas,
Anti-Imperialist Action Ireland,
Cairde na Filipínigh Committee.