Transition Council
should Address Landlessness, Debt and Globalization – Peasant, Fisherfolk
Leaders
Bulatlat
interviewed two known mass leaders from the basic sectors – Pedro
Gonzales, concurrently national vice chairperson and vice chairperson for
the Southern Tagalog region of the Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang
Mamamalakaya (Pamalakaya or National Fisherfolk Movement); and Imelda
Lacandazo, national vice chairperson of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng
Pilipinas (KMP or Philippine Peasant Movement), who attended the SoNA
rally. What do they think of the transition council idea?
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN
REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
In the campaign to
oust President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo – who is under fire for alleged
cheating in the 2004 elections as well as large-scale corruption and what
cause-oriented groups describe as her government’s imposition of
anti-national and anti-people policies – there has been considerable talk
about the idea of a transition council.
Various political
forces agree that the transition council proposed as a replacement to the
Macapagal-Arroyo regime, should it be ousted from power, would undertake
the tasks of carrying out a number of reforms for a certain period, after
which it would call for special elections. It is on what reforms are to be
carried out by the transition council that there are still differences
among the several anti-Arroyo forces.
The non-traditional
anti-Arroyo forces, however, all point to the basic sectors – the
peasantry and fisherfolk, workers and urban poor – as the ultimate
beneficiaries of the reforms that a transition council would undertake.
Let us hear then from
those hailing from the basic sectors. What do they think of a transition
council? What kind of program do they think a transition council should
embark upon?
There was much talk
of a transition council at the rally during Macapagal-Arroyo’s State of
the Nation Address (SoNA) last July 25, where various groups like the
Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan or New Patriotic Alliance), the Gloria
Step Down Movement (GSM), the United Opposition (UNO), the National
Council for Concerned Volunteers (NCCV), and the Be Not Afraid Movement
participated.
Bulatlat
interviewed two known mass leaders from the basic sectors – Pedro
Gonzales, concurrently national vice chairperson and vice chairperson for
the Southern Tagalog region of the Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang
Mamamalakaya (Pamalakaya or National Fisherfolk Movement); and Imelda
Lacandazo, national vice chairperson of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng
Pilipinas (KMP or Philippine Peasant Movement), who attended the SoNA
rally. What do they think of the transition council idea?
Sovereignty, social justice
Gonzales and
Lacandazo are both of the view that a transition council should address
issues related to sovereignty and social justice.
“The basis of unity
(for a transition council) should be national sovereignty, democracy, and
genuine independence,” said Gonzales, who is also known to fellow
activists as Tata Pido. He added that a transition council should first of
all cut down on the country’s foreign debt, and then institutionalize
policies that would control the exploitation of the country’s resources by
foreign investors.
The country’s foreign
debt amounts to $55.3 billion as of end-March 2005. Debt servicing
currently gobbles up as much as 49 percent of the Philippines’ yearly
budgetary allocations.
|
Lacandazo |
Meanwhile, Lacandazo
said the transition council should address the issue of landlessness.
“Because the main problem of the peasantry is landlessness, the call is
for genuine land reform,” she explained. “The first step toward that
should be the confiscation of the lands of big landlords, so that these
could be concentrated on the people’s government and not on Gloria’s
government and farmers who have long been landless and have long been
struggling for land can have their own land.”
The peasantry
comprises more than 70 percent of the Philippine population, and most
Filipino peasants are known to be landless.
Now because the
campaign to oust Macapagal-Arroyo is a broad-based fight, those who work
within traditional political frameworks but who have been opposing the
Macapagal-Arroyo regime are also to be represented in the transition
council. What do Gonzales and Lacandazo think of this?
Present agenda
“So long as they are
now fighting the Macapagal-Arroyo regime, why not?” Lacandazo said. “But
they should present their agenda. We have to see if their agenda is really
for the benefit of the broad masses of Filipinos. There may those among
them whose agenda is for their own interest.”
Gonzales expressed a
similar view.
Considering that the
transition council could include representatives of sections of the elite
who are opposed to the Macapagal-Arroyo regime, how far do they think the
people’s demands can go under its watch? Both leaders think the transition
council would not yet mean the complete victory of what they call the
people’s struggle to change the social system, but it would be a step
forward in the fight.
Progressive groups
under the banner of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan or New Patriotic
Alliance) have been batting for a people’s democratic council to be
composed of “patriotic and pro-people figures” with a track record of
integrity and competence as political leaders, as well as democratic and
progressive elements from the opposition parties that play significant
roles in the anti-Arroyo campaign.
The people’s
democratic council, according to Bayan, would draft a nationalist-oriented
and progressive constitution. After that, it will call for genuine
elections.
|
Gonzales |
It would also
undertake a number of urgent tasks, including: investigation of the
involvement and culpability of Macapagal-Arroyo, former election official
Virgilio Garcillano, military officials, and others involved in poll
fraud; implementation of electoral and political reforms; rendering of
justice and indemnification to human rights victims; and ensuring the
protection of and respect for civil liberties; resumption of peace
negotiations with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the
National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) through the
fulfillment of all existing agreements; solving the fiscal crisis by
canceling or repudiating all odious debts; and protecting the country from
the ravages of free-market globalization and reversing the disastrous
structural adjustment programs imposed by the country’s creditors.
Gonzales ran last
year for a seat in the Quezon provincial board under the banner of
Anakpawis (Toiling Masses), and survived what many view as a
politically-motivated assassination attempt that has left him partially
crippled. Lacandazo is known as a leading peasant activist not only in the
Philippines but also abroad, and has spoken in many international peasant
forums. Bulatlat
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