This story
was taken from Bulatlat, the Philippines's alternative weekly
newsmagazine (www.bulatlat.com, www.bulatlat.net, www.bulatlat.org).
Vol. VI, No. 5, March 5-11, 2006
Commentary
Reign of
Terror Continues
Gloria M. Arroyo has lifted Proclamation No. 1017 in an obvious bid to render
moot and academic the complaints filed before the Supreme Court. The people must
intensify their protest mass actions and encourage the civilian officials and
military and police officers to withdraw their support from the Arroyo
administration. We can expect the oust-Arroyo mass movement to intensify in the
days and weeks to come. BY
PROF. JOSE MARIA SISON
Gloria M. Arroyo has lifted Proclamation No.
1017 in an obvious bid to render moot and academic the complaints filed before
the Supreme Court of the Philippine reactionary government against her regime’s
curtailment of democratic rights and use of martial law powers without complying
with such constitutional requirements as reporting to Congress and seeking its
approval.
Proclamation No. 1017 is deceptively called
declaration of a “state of national emergency” but its mandatory part is a
verbatim copy of the Marcos martial law declaration, Proclamation No. 1081. By
this proclamation, Arroyo usurps martial powers.
These include the power to issue decrees and
orders, order arrests without judicial warrant, curtail the freedom of speech
and assembly, disperse rallies and strikes, take over public utilities, mass
media and other businesses supposedly imbued with “public interest” and so on,
under the pretext of suppressing lawless violence, rebellion and insurrection.
Arroyo herself and her top subalterns in the
cabinet and in the police and military have announced that she can issue again
and again a proclamation with a draconian content identical to that Proclamation
No. 1017. They have also boasted that, with or without such a proclamation,
they can continue to carry out repressive measures against the people and the
broad united front of patriotic, progressive and other forces opposing the
Arroyo regime.
Proclamation No. 1017 was premised on the big
lie that there was a coup conspiracy of “communists” and “military adventurists”
and that a coup attempt was foiled on February 24. The truth is that the regime
used the proclamation to preempt and break up the mass actions celebrating the
20th anniversary of the fall of the Marcos fascist dictatorship.
The regime feared that the military and police
would withdraw support from it as they had done in Edsa 1 and Edsa 2 if the
people’s assembly had been allowed to grow big on February 24. No coup at all
was attempted by any group of military and police officers. It was the Arroyo
ruling clique that carried out a coup by usurping martial law powers and
violating the constitutional requirements of congressional approval and
oversight and judicial warrants for arrests and searches.
At great expense of public resources, the Arroyo
regime continues to wage a propaganda campaign to misrepresent as a “conspiracy”
of communists and military officers of the reactionary government the consensus
and active efforts of all anti-Arroyo forces in the broad united front to
encourage the military and police to withdraw their support from the regime but
not to make a coup for themselves in violation of the principle of civilian
supremacy.
Arroyo and her principal accomplices are
accountable for concocting the so-called coup conspiracy and coup attempt,
adopting and implementing Proclamation No. 1017 and for violating the democratic
rights of those victimized by the proclamation, such as the rallyists who were
brutally attacked, all those arrested without judicial warrant, the six
congressmen so grievously persecuted, several newspaper offices raided and
messed up to intimidate all mass media, all those falsely charged with rebellion
and coup d’etat and so on.
The Arroyo regime will continue to issue
proclamations, decrees and orders for the purpose of curtailing democratic
rights and repressing the people in its pursuit to prolong its illegitimate and
immoral rule and ram through the treasonous Arroyo-De Venecia charter-change
scheme. This scheme is aimed at crowning Arroyo with Marcosian dictatorial
powers and making other anti-national and anti-democratic constitutional
amendments in line with the economic and military dictates of the US.
The Arroyo regime is obstinately treading the
bloody path of fascist dictatorship and state terrorism. Even before the
issuance of Proclamation No. 1017, the regime was already engaged in gross human
rights violations, especially in the Bantay Laya military campaigns of
suppression against the toiling masses of workers and peasants. So many trade
union and peasants leaders, youth and women activists, human rights workers,
priests and pastors, journalists, lawyers, officers and members of progressive
party list groups have been kidnapped and tortured to death or gunned down in
public places by the death squads of the Arroyo regime.
Since 2001 Arroyo has openly approved and
praised the reign of terror and has rapidly promoted military and police
officers who are notorious torturers and murderers. The terrorism of her regime
will continue and increase its viciousness, despite the lifting of Proclamation
No. 1017. It is planned and directed by a cluster of her cabinet members in
charge of national security, with the technical assistance of the topmost
officers of the various intelligence agencies. The bloody crimes of the growing
fascist dictatorship are driving so many people to join the revolutionary
underground and wage armed revolution, according to revolutionary publications.
The broad masses of the people and the broad
united front of patriotic, progressive and other anti-Arroyo forces have no
choice but to intensify their protest mass actions and encourage the civilian
officials and military and police officers of the reactionary government to
withdraw their support from the Arroyo ruling clique. We can expect the
oust-Arroyo mass movement to intensify in the National Capital Region (NCR) and
nationwide in the days and weeks to come. Posted by Bulatlat © 2006 Bulatlat
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