Maj. Gen. Rodolfo Garcia, chief of the Northern Luzon Command (Nolcom), said this new "taxation" scheme of the underground movement has surfaced from reports of military operating units in Northern and Central Luzon.
"Such is a desperate attempt of the communist movement to generate funds for the so-called ‘national democratic revolution,’" Garcia said.
Nolcom has two Army infantry divisions (composed of six brigades) or some 10,000 troopers scattered all over the Ilocos, Cordillera, Cagayan Valley and Central Luzon regions.
"We have monitoring such illegal activities (of the rebels), especially in very remote barangays," Garcia said. "Families of OFWs are very prone to such (extortion) because of fear of reprisals from the rebels."
Ready cash
Because families of OFWs living in far-flung communities have ready cash unlike farmers who can only give goods like rice, "these families are the new victims," he said.
According to Garcia, the insurgents send a "demand letter" to an OFW’s family asking for a fixed amount. They then follow it up and directly confront the victim.
When their "target" refuses, Garcia said the rebels harass the family until they give in.
"We cannot blame the families (of OFWs) because it is a matter of life and death, but we try to defeat this rebel effort in areas where our troops and armed auxiliaries like the CAFGUs are present," he said.
Garcia said the rebels may still be conducting their traditional "taxation" of local politicians, businessmen and even government employees of either cash or kind like guns, ammunition, handheld radios or uniforms.
He said barangay officials are more prone compared to mayors, congressmen and governors, although this could not easily be confirmed, except when these government officials volunteer information about such extortion.
"We cannot fully confirm that because it should be the mayors and the town treasurers who should give the information," Garcia said.
He, however, could not say how much the insurgents are getting from this "revolutionary taxation" in a month, but added it may run into hundreds of millions of pesos.
He cited a document seized in a captured New People’s Army (NPA) camp in Ilocos Sur on June 16 last year that showed that lowly farmers, businessmen and politicians were "contributing" to the underground movement.
"In that particular document, there was an entry where one million pesos was ‘contributed’ by a single unidentified ‘taxpayer.’ It was either a big corporation or individual," he said.
These extortion activities, he said, may be happening not only in the North but also elsewhere in the country.
"It is based carefully on our social investigation of their economic status," said Martin Montana, the command’s spokesman.
He claimed it is a "cardinal rule" among their members to "never steal a single thread and return back anything borrowed, especially to the masses it serves."
Montana admitted that they enforced a "permit-to-campaign taxation" on candidates during the last national elections in so-called NPA-influenced and -controlled communities to show their "political authority."
However, Montana did not mention whether the NPA will influence the forthcoming barangay elections.