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'Vacillating' CPP-NPA-NDF puzzles Duterte

July 5, 2017 | 12:25pm

'Vacillating' CPP-NPA-NDF puzzles Duterte

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, right, reviews the troops with Army Chief Lt. Gen. Glorioso Miranda, left, during the 120th anniversary celebration of the Philippine Army Tuesday, April 4, 2017 at Fort Bonifacio in Taguig City, Philippines. AP/Bullit Marquez, file

MANILA, Philippines — President Rodrigo Duterte on Wednesday compared communist rebels to a moving electric fan, saying he no longer understands the mixed signals they are sending.

Duterte noted that the communist party had ordered its fighters to attack government troops but at the same time offered to help in the campaign against Maute terrorists in Marawi City.

“You know guys, you’re like an electric fan… (You are) vacillating. First, you said during the martial law proclamation, you ordered your troops, the NPAs (New People’s Army) to engage us, the government forces actively. Then you change your mind and you said you’re going to cooperate …I really cannot understand you guys,” Duterte said during the 64th founding anniversary of Hagonoy, Davao del Sur.

“You’re like an electric fan: right to left, left to right,” Duterte, who offered to accept members of the NPA, Moro Islamic Liberation Front and Moro National Liberation Front in the fight against terrorism then later quietly withdrew the offer, said.

In a speech in Camp Agaab in Sarangani also on Wednesday, Duterte said he is puzzled why soldiers continue to die at the hands of the communist rebels.

“Ang hindi ko talaga maintindihan, kung meron ditong nakikinig na NPA, talagang sumasabog ang ulo ninyo (What I cannot understand, if there is an NPA member listening, why does your head keep on exploding)?” the president said.

“You directed your soldiers to fight, to engage us, government. Later on, you said you will fight alongside government. Then you said you will fight with us again. (Instead) of just really doing what you want to say or what you want to do, we still have encounters. That’s the reason why I am not complacent,” he added.

Duterte reminded soldiers to “learn the ways of survival” and to remain vigilant to avoid being shot by the rebels.

Last May, the government suspended the fifth round of negotiations with communists after the CPP directed the NPA to carry out more attacks against government forces enforcing martial law in Mindanao.

The NDF, the communists’ negotiating panel, then ordered the NPA to refrain from launching offensives against government troops so they can focus on defeating terrorists in Mindanao. The rebels even expressed the readiness to fight alongside the soldiers flushing out the Maute bandits in Marawi but Duterte refused the offer.

Despite the pronouncement, some NPA members figured in attacks in parts of the Visayas and Mindanao.

Brig. Gen. Restituto Padilla, spokesman for the Armed Forces of the Philippines, said Wednesday that the NPA is among the targets of the martial law declaration. This, less than two months since Silvestre Bello III, Labor secretary and government peace panel head said that "the president, in no uncertain terms, categorically declared he was not after the New People’s Army."

In a statement dated June 30, the first anniversary of the Duterte administration, the CPP said the NPA must “do everything to rapidly build new platoons and companies of regular guerrilla forces and local guerrilla units to enable the people the opportunity to rise up with arms against their exploiters and oppressors.”

“In the face of the Duterte regime’s all-out war, the NPA must continue to seize the initiative and carry out more and more tactical offensives nationwide in order to derail and blunt the all-out attacks of the AFP, punish the most notorious human rights abusers, defend the interests against the people and bring forward the people’s war,” the party said.

While the government and the rebels continue to engage in a verbal tiff, the two sides agreed to resume the peace negotiations next month.

Duterte said it is painful for him to learn about Filipinos killing fellow Filipinos.

“You (communists) kill the human initiative and you want to perpetuate a war that has been going on for the last 50 years. Do you want us to fight for another 50 years?” the president said.

“It is not easy to read that I lose five soldiers in one gun battle,” he added.

The president also posed a question to CPP founder Jose Ma. Sison, whom he described as “seriously sick.”

“You are not dying but you are seriously sick. Would you be happy to see that there is peace in this country before you finally close your eyes?” the president said.