Progressive youths rejected Ferdinand Marcos Jr’s “Bagong Pilipinas” campaign which he is set to flaunt in his upcoming third State of the Nation Address (SONA) this July.

“In Marcos’s Bagong Pilipinas, the administration just glamorized the previous administrations rotten practices’ to show ‘progress’ which in reality is the opposite,” League of Filipino Students president Elle Buntag said at the youth press conference on July 10 titled “Bagong Pilipinas: Reyal or Fakeh?”

Bagong Pilipinas is nothing but false promises and useless measures that fail to provide affordable education to Filipinos, defend national sovereignty and human rights, the group said.

“The economy is down, thousands of young Filipinos are jobless, and the country has no strong industry. But what is Marcos Jr’s answer to this? Labor export in the face of global competence and job readiness,” the group said.

The youth also denounced the thousands of cases of human rights violations, intensification of rural militarization, extrajudicial killings and called out the regime for its useless programs in resolving the people’s issues. They also condemned Marcos’s servility to the US imperialist and his willingness to drag the country into its saber-rattling with China.

“There is nothing new in Bagong Pilipinas and Bayan Bangon Muli is just a long nightmare for the people,” he said.

LFS and other youth groups will participate in the protest of Marcos’ third SONA on July 22.