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Protest
Action by Hundreds of Soldiers
Exposes Rottenness of US-Arroyo Regime
By
Prof. Jose Maria Sison
NDFP Chief Political Consultant, and
International League of Peoples’ Struggle General Consultant
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The 27 July 2003 protest action of nearly 300 soldiers of the reactionary
government, including 70 officers from the army and navy, has effectively
exposed from inside the rottenness of the US-directed Arroyo regime in the most
glaring way.
The grievances of the soldiers have reverberated not only throughout the
Philippines but also the entire world. They are well-grounded. They should not
be obscured by retaliatory attacks from the regime. They give the protesting
soldiers the just and reasonable cause for demanding the resignation of
President Arroyo and defense secretary General Angelo Reyes.
The grievances include the corruption of the regime, involving the aforesaid
high officials, at the expense of the junior officers and ordinary soldiers and
the terrorist bombings engineered by General Reyes and his sidekick General
Victor Corpus in Mindanao to pave the way for US military intervention,
increased military supplies from the Pentagon and the declaration of martial law
in August.
The supposed sale of weapons by the regime to the New People’s Army is the
only grievance to which Ka Roger Rosal, spokesperson of the Communist Party of
the Philippines, has taken an exception in a press statement. He avers that a
relatively few weapons are sold by some officers and soldiers to the NPA. But he
declares that the NPA acquires most of its weapons from the AFP by capturing
these through tactical offensives.
The US-Arroyo regime is determined to belittle and discredit the soldier
protesters as mere messianic mutineers and unthinking tools of the political
opponents of the regime. In my view, most important of all is to recognize the
fact that the regime has become so rotten and isolated that even its officers
and soldiers are rising up against it.
The hundreds that have dared to make public protest manifest the grievances of
thousands and thousands of soldiers in the reactionary armed forces. In time to
come, there will be more outbursts of grievances and concerted protests by the
soldiers. The ground is exceedingly fertile. It is an urgent task for patriotic
and progressive cadres to do revolutionary work within the reactionary army.
Like the Bolsheviks did in the czarist army, the revolutionary cadres can
persuade the soldiers in the reactionary army to shift to the people’s side
and can thereby disintegrate the reactionary army to hasten the victory of the
revolution. After all, the ordinary soldiers of the reactionary army are
recruited mainly from the impoverished workers and peasants.
Very few responded to the call of Cardinal Sin for people to go to the Edsa
shrine and defend the stinking Arroyo regime. Likewise the self-indulgent
political opponents of the regime could bring only a few to give support to the
protesting soldiers. It is clear that only a just cause that gains beforehand
the support of the national democratic movement can rouse the broad masses of
the people to a high level of commitment and militancy.
The protest action of the soldiers of the reactionary armed has come on the eve
of the so-called state of the nation address of President Arroyo. It is a big
comeuppance for her. It is important for the national democratic movement headed
by BAYAN to call the attention of the entire people and all those in the
reactionary government to the reality check, the real state of the nation report
of BAYAN against Arroyo’s pack of lies.
I am confident BAYAN will expose clearly the puppetry, extreme forms of
exploitation, corruption and brutality of the regime and demand the basic
reforms and fundamental changes required to end the neocolonial reign of terror
and greed in the Philippines. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo should now find it ever
more impossible to conjure the illusion of a strong republic in the face of
rebellious troops in her own army and the people living in hunger and misery.
July
28, 2003
(Paper
Distributed/Read at a Public Forum "Understanding the Oakwood Mutiny"
Sponsored by BAYAN, 16 Aug. 2003 PCED Hostel UP Diliman, Quezon City)
Bulatlat.com
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