A MULTI-SECTORAL group denounced violence committed by communist terrorist groups (CTG) in the Cordillera region through an indignation rally joined by Catholics, Muslims, and other religious groups.
For 51 years, Police Regional Office Cordillera (PRO-COR) director Israel Ephraim Dickson said the Communist Party of the Philippines – New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) has brought nothing but suffering and death to the Filipino people.
“Magkaisa was the battle cry in the aftermath of Edsa, which saw numerous CPP-NPA leaders released from prison. Instead of taking the opportunity to unite with the people in building a better society, these released leaders employed insurrectionist strategies in their attempts to steal the newly-gained democracy,” Brigadier General Dickson said.
Dickson pointed out that majority of Filipinos reject the homicidal ideology of communism after the CPP-NPA turned on its own cadres in a frenzy of torture and murder.
The Cordillera top cop recalled in his own hometown of San Juan, Abra, he experienced first-hand the terror wrought by the CPP-NPA who raided their municipal hall and brutally murdered the wounded police.
Dickson added communists atrocities were also discovered in the different parts of the country such as the killing fields discovered in Compostela Valley in Mindanao through Samar and Negros in the Visayas; from Albay to the mountains of Apayao which he said bear witness to the tragic end of numerous idealistic youth stabbed, hacked, shot, or even buried alive by their own comrades to which the CPP-NPA apologized to the families of their own cadres despite their so-called rectification in 1992.
“Fifty-one years of murder and mayhem, the CPP-NPA and their minions in the NDF have nothing to show with regards to a genuine desire for peace. Since the presidency of Gen. Fidel Ramos to the current Duterte Administration, peace talks have been proffered to them with the hope of arriving at a just and lasting peace,” Dickson adds.
Dickson meanwhile advised the public that with the experiences of the Whole-of-Nation Approach, it should be the beacon by which the country can truly attain peace for its children and the generations to come.
“Only our united and firm stand against the violence of the CPP-NPA-NDF can ensure their sincerity in working with the government to finally attain peace and reconciliation. No more to murder, torture, extortion, and other forms of terrorism of the CPP-NPA!” Dickson added.
Lieutenant Colonel Radino Belly, Baguio City Police Office (BCPO) community relations and public information officer, meanwhile, said and indignation rally started at Session Road and ended with a program at Malcolm Square with close to 800 participants who pledge their support for Executive Order 70.
Similar rallies were held in La Trinidad in Benguet, Mountain Province and other parts of the region.
President Rodrigo Duterte’s Executive Order (EO) 70 seeks to institute a “whole of government” approach in addressing communist insurgency, which resulted in decreased armed engagements between government troops and NPA.