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Monday, December 29, 2003
Arroyo vows end to NPA campaign fees
KORONADAL CITY -- Communist guerillas are asking from P50,000 to P500,000 from politicians as permit to campaign fees, a practice described by President Arroyo as "extortion" and which she vowed to stop this election period.
National Democratic Front (NDF) spokesman Jorge Madlos, alias Ka Oris, said no candidate wanting to campaign in strongholds of communist guerillas would be spared from paying campaign fees. The NDF is the political arm of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).
Madlos said the rate of campaign fees is P500,000 for governor; between P300,000 to P500,000 for those seeking congressional posts, and between P50,000 to P500,000 for those running for mayor.
For a whole party slate, the campaign fee rate is P1.5 million or above, he added.
"Extortion yun eh. Kontra sa batas yun eh. So kailangan, ipairal ang batas (That's extortion. That's illegal. So, we need to impose the law)," Arroyo said, in reaction to the statement of the communist group that all candidates for public office in the 2004 elections must pay the campaign fee.
She said her government would stop this practice of the New People's Army (NPA), the armed wing of the CPP.
Madlos said they earned P40 million from campaign fees in the 2001 elections and added he would welcome a "media-led audit team" to check on how the money was used.
Plain extortion
Arroyo, asked on how she intended to go about preventing the NPA from harassing candidates, especially those running for local posts, replied, "law enforcement."
But she said government would pursue peace talks with the communist group. She also said Norway is helping in the exploratory talks, not only by hosting the venue, but also by helping mediate the negotiations.
Defense Secretary Eduardo Ermita said military and police are focused on stopping the NPA's reported extort activities in the Southern Tagalog region, Eastern Samar province and in Mindanao.
South Cotabato Police Director Senior Supt. Romeo Rufino urged candidates not to pay any campaign fee.
In Eastern Samar, said Ermita, a candidate for provincial governor, a former congressman, is complaining against the campaign fee. He declined to name the candidate.
He said the NPA's tax collection activities heightened after the US and the European Union (EU) branded the communist group a terrorist organization and ordered its assets frozen.
Police agreed that the campaign fee is plain extortion.
Growing stronger
The communist group is not supporting any candidate vying for a national post but would back "progressive candidates" running for provincial, city or municipal posts, said NDF Peace Panel Chairman Luis Jalandoni.
"In the national level, we see that this elections would not anymore give solutions to the fundamental problems of the people," Jalandoni said in a local radio interview.
Jalandoni said the NDF considers the political workout in the national level as "an exercise in futility," which also does not offer a solution to pressing problems of the country.
But in the local level, he added, candidates with "progressive platforms" would earn "limited gains from the NDF-CPP-NPA and the areas it influenced."
Jalandoni claimed that communist forces are growing stronger, "mustering support in more than 8,000 villages or maintaining influences in about 800 municipalities and 90 percent of the provinces in the country." (Sun.Star General Santos/With SCT)
(December 29, 2003 issue)
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