[asia-apec 1239] Fwd: ESTRADA POLICY IS TO INTENSIFY OPPRESSION AND EXPLOITATION OF THE PEOPLE

[BAYAN]

>International Network for Philippine Studies
>Stichting INPS
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>
>
>ESTRADA POLICY IS TO INTENSIFY
>OPPRESSION AND EXPLOITATION OF THE PEOPLE
>
>By Jose Maria Sison
>NDFP Chief Political Consultant
>July 27, 1999
>
>
>Mr. Joseph Ejercito Estrada insults the people by pretending to be
>pro-poor.  His policy is to intensify the oppression and exploitation of
>the people, especially the working class and the peasantry.
>
>Mr. Estrada has further impoverished the people by following the dictates
>of the multinational firms and banks and such multilateral agencies as the
>IMF, World Bank and WTO.  He can only aggravate the current economic crisis
>by further sinking the country into indebtedness.
> 
>In only one year of rule, the Estrada regime has abused both foreign and
>domestic borrowing like no one of his predecessors ever did.  He has
>brought the foreign debt from the June 1998 level of USD 52 billion to the
>current level of more than USD 67 billion.  He has brought the local public
>debt from the June 1998 level of 788 billion pesos to  the current level of
>more than 900 billion pesos.  These debts must be seen behind the boasts of
>economic recovery, increased international reserves and lower rates of
>currency exchange, interest and inflation.
>
>As of the end of 1998, the economic growth is negative 0.5 percent, despite
>the falsification of statistical data in various sectors of the economy.
>The Philippine economy is increasingly a net food importer, despite the
>guesstimate of increased agricultural output in the first half of 1999.
>The lower peso-to-dollar exchange rate and lower interest rate will soon
>deplete the borrowed resources as the favored business firms and cronies
>hasten to grab cheaper domestic loans and bring out dollars faster out of
>the country.
>
>The kind of exports that the country makes, which are low value-added
>semimanufactures and raw materials, are all squeezed by the global crisis
>of overproduction.  The bigger the volume of low value-added manufactures
>are exported the more dollars flow out of the country because of the prior
>overpricing of imported components.  Trade deficits will continue to
>afflict the reactionary government and make it a beggar of foreign loans,
>at more onerous terms.
>
>Mr. Estrada thinks that he can engage in pump-priming. But what kind of
>productive system  does he have for stimulating?  It is an agrarian and
>semifeudal economy, still dependent on the export of raw and
>semimanufactures with added value of only about 10 percent.  All these
>exports are now in global oversupply.  These can never yield any net income
>to catch up with the import costs and the growth of the debt burden.
>
>The wanton deficit-spending and presidential monopoly of the pork barrel
>are all meant to feed  bureaucratic corruption.   As in the time of Marcos,

>the graft-ridden and overpriced infrastructure-building and importation of
>equipment and supplies, especially from creditor Japan, will benefit the
>big compradors and landlords and not the poor workers and peasants.  
>
>To raise domestic resources, in addition to local public borrowing, he is
>driven to auction off remaining state assets and to raise the taxes on
>basic consumption goods.  While the common people are crushed by the
>growing  tax burden and increasing prices, Estrada's cronies enjoy tax
>amnesty and engage in tax evasion. 
>
>Mr. Estrada has brought back with him to the highest level of political
>power the Marcos family and the biggest and most notorious Marcos cronies.
>These scoundrels are being exculpated, enjoy their ill-gotten wealth and
>are primed to further plunder the country. Under the direction of Estrada,
>the same legal experts used in the past by Marcos and Eduardo Cojuangco are
>either secretly cooking up compromise agreements at the expense of the
>people or are fixing both the prosecution side and the courts to produce
>decisions favorable to the plunderers.  
>
>Since the fall of the fascist dictator Marcos in 1986, there has merely
>been a merry-go-round of big comprador-landlord cliques subservient to US
>imperialism.  The succession of post-Marcos regimes has come to a full
>circle with the return to power of the Marcos political descendants.
>Shame on those renegades from the national democratic movement who now
>cohabit with Estrada, the Marcoses and the Marcos cronies. 
>
>It is pure nonsense, a deliberate lie of the demagogue, for Estrada to
>claim that he is waging a war on poverty, when in fact he acts as the chief
>political representative of the most exploitative big compradors and
>landlords and he himself is scandalously amassing wealth at the expense of
>the working people.
>
>The Estrada regime is so subservient to foreign monopoly capitalism  that
>he is explicitly against national industrial development.  He is also
>against land reform even as he cynically glorifies the biggest landgrabber
>as the godfather of land reform.  He claims to promote agricultural
>productivity and food security for the purpose of securing foreign loans to
>feed bureaucratic corruption and improving the infrastructure of landlord
>rule in the countryside.
>
>Unemployment is rampant, even as his statisticians claim that the
>Philippines has a rate of unemployment that is almost equal to that of
>Germany or the European Union.  The prices of basic commodities are soaring
>but the same kind of statisticians keep on manipulating the basket of goods
>and falsifying prices.  The real  wage and income levels of the working
>people and middle social strata are being systematically pushed down.  The
>entire people live in misery.  The basic economic and social rights of the
>working people are being violated.
>
>In reaction to the people's clamor for their basic  democratic rights,
>Estrada has intensified the military and police campaigns of suppression.
>He has also terminated the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations.  He has done so in
>order to avoid the implementation of the GRP-NDFP Comprehensive Agreement

>on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law and the
>negotiation on social and economic reforms.
>
>So long as Estrada is president of the reactionary government, the GRP-NDFP
>peace negotiations can never be resumed because he sets as precondition the
>capitulation of the revolutionary movement.  He has declared that he has no
>other scheme but to apply divisive tactics on the revolutionary forces.  He
>forgets that these forces are highly  conscious of their revolutionary
>cause and are firmly united against their enemy.
>It is absolutely clear that Estrada is hellbent on making himself appear
>macho by taunting the revolutionary movement.  He forgets that precisely
>because of the fascism of his political mentor  Marcos the people's army
>grew from a few scores to thousands of Red fighters nationwide.  Now, the
>current level of strength of all the revolutionary forces and their
>organized mass base are a far cry from that in 1972.
>
>Mr. Estrada  bullies the press and all his critics and opponents within the
>ruling system in his drive to intimidate them and to remove all obstacles
>to the unbridled oppression and exploitation of the people.  His actions
>and actuations are reminiscent of Marcos in the preparation for the
>suspension of the writ of habeas corpus and eventually the declaration of
>martial law.
>
>The general run of journalists, church leaders and political opponents of
>Mr. Estrada are timid and accommodating to him.  For instance, they have
>never taken Mr. Estrada to task for flagrantly misappropriating public
>funds in using presidential guards and government facilities for the
>benefit of as many as six full-time mistresses, including the reported
>latest recipient of a mansion on a one-hectare spread.  This is not an
>amusing personal matter but a serious matter of public interest.
>
>In their wisdom, the common people are asking:  Can someone who can give
>one or two mansions to each of six mistresses be free from corruption and
>collusion with the exploiting classes and really do any good for the poor?
>This is one question that the Manila press has never dared to ask.
>
>To assure himself of military means from the US to attack the people, he
>has pushed for the ratification of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA).  In
>the process, he has blatantly violated the principle of national
>sovereignty and has run afoul of his own constitution, which prohibits
>foreign military bases and foreign troops and the surrender of jurisdiction
>over criminal cases to a foreign power.  
>
>He is pushing for the amendment of the 1987 constitution in order to
>curtail political and civil rights, extend unlimited landownership and
>other extraordinary privileges to foreign monopoly capitalists and annul
>provisions violated by the VFA.   He is determined to compel the two houses
>of Congress to form themselves into a constituent assembly, despite the
>popular opposition to tinkering with the 1987 constitution.
>
>As a consequence of its puppetry, corruption and brutality, the US
>Estrada-regime is isolated and is now confronted by the outraged people and
>a broad united front of patriotic and democratic forces.   

>
>It is untrue that Estrada continues to be able to deceive large numbers of
>people.  Only some mercenaries in the mass media and opinion poll survey
>firms continue to conjure the illusion of popularity.  A captive audience
>of only 6000 attended the  recent failed extravaganza of the so-called
>Katipunan Kontra sa Kahirapan, featuring himself and his fellow actors at
>the Rizal Park.
>
>The US -Estrada regime is one more bitter episode in the process of
>degeneration of the ruling system of big compradors and landlords.  It can
>accomplish nothing beneficial to the people.  It can only aggravate the
>crisis of the ruling system.
>
>Under the present circumstances, the revolutionary movement of the people
>for national liberation and democracy through people's war can advance
>rapidly.  In due course, the basic tactical offensives of the people's army
>to seize arms from the reactionary armed forces will resound further.
>
>The people are also demanding that, in addition to basic tactical
>offensives, special tactical offensives be launched against the most
>notorious plunderers and violators of human rights in order to broadcast
>the revolutionary message faster and puncture the arrogance of those in
power.
>
>The US-Estrada regime and its camp followers themselves are mocking at the
>armed revolutionary movement and challenging it to demonstrate its fighting
>mettle.  They are practically inciting the people and the people's army to
>deliver more resounding blows .
>
>I presume that the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the
>Philippines is responsive to the people's clamor for armed revolution and
>is conscious of the exceedingly favorable conditions for advancing the
>protracted people's war.
>
>Contrary to the demagogic lie of Estrada, the leadership of the revolution
>is not abroad.  It is in the Philippines, deeply rooted among the masses of
>workers and peasants.   It is more than ever determined to overthrow a
>ruling system, whose leaders like Estrada wallow in the filth of corruption
>and still have the temerity to pretend at being pro-poor.  #
>
>
>-
>Roger K. Holmes
>NDFP Website Staff
>URL:  http://www.geocities.com/~cpp-ndf   or
>         http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/2078/index.html
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