The Philippines: NPA celebrates 54th Anniversary
The New People’s Army of the Philippines, led by the Communist Party of Philippines (CPP), celebrates its 54th anniversary. The NPA was founded in 1969 and “had an initial force of 60 Red fighters and commanders with nine automatic rifles, 26 single-shot rifles and handguns, and a mass base of around 80,000 in the first district of Tarlac province.” Nowadays it has thousands of fighters, and a mass base of millions around the country, spreading on the multiple islands which form the country. Throughout the years, the old State has carried out multiple campaigns of encirclement and suppression, which the NPA has successfully overcome, as well as genocides towards the people to destroy the revolution.
The newspaper of the CPP Ang Bayan reports on an event in Eastern Visayas, where the soldiers and masses came together on 27th of March to celebrate the anniversary. With the event, they defied the 8th Infantry Division of the Philippine Army, which has been conducting an all-out attack on the NPA forces in the area since the beginning of the year.
Combatants, cadres and militants of the Party and members of revolutionary mass organizations declared their determination to advance the People’s War. A military parade and poems were performed to honor the martyrs of the revolution. The program emphasized the necessity of strengthening the Party leadership in the Army and among the masses, enforcing the determination to struggle against the increasing State repression in the area, and the importance for the movement to study Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and the basic principles of the Party. Multiple speeches were held, and the editorial of the Ang Bayan in Winaray language was read. After this, the participants had the opportunity to ask questions and raise issues they wanted to be clarified. In the discussion the destruction and increasing poverty caused by the operations carried out by the old State in the area were highlighted. Additionally, cultural performances were presented. Hence, the event was a success, and all this was possible to arrange without the old State forces having a clue.
Also in the capital city Manila the members Kabataang Makabayan (KM), which is a clandestine organization of the youth, made a flash rally on the 2nd of April. Local people in different areas of Manila helped in the preparations of banners, flags, face masks and contacting media. Many people passing by stopped to listen to the short speech being held and nodded approvingly. Despite the intimidation and persecution of the police, the rally was successfully held and after the program, the participants disappeared into the crowd. Ang Bayan says that in the upcoming weeks, many youth from the KM will head to the countryside and join the NPA.
The Central Committee of the CPP greets the anniversary in a statement published in a special edition of Ang Bayan:
”The New People’s Army has incessantly waged more than five decades of intense and relentless people’s war against US imperialism and its oppressive client-state of big bourgeois compradors and big landlords. This is testimony to the iron will and determination of the Filipino people to do everything humanly possible to put an end to four centuries of uninterrupted colonial subjugation and semi colonial domination that has oppressed and exploited countless generations of toiling people in the country, and which continue to condemn them to a permanent state of crisis and hardship.
From its small beginnings, the NPA has become a nationwide force of several thousand Red fighters. Although it remains small and weak compared to the US-trained and -funded puppet Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), its unbending loyalty and boundless ties to the broad masses of peasants, workers and toiling people, combined with the correct leadership of the Party guarantees its continuous growth and ultimate victory.”
The CPP highlights that the Party is determined to lead the NPA and to develop the People’s War. In order to succeed, it needs to solidify itself ideologically, politically and organizationally, to study past experiences and to keep on developing its links to the masses.
They also write that the time is ever more ripe for People’s War as the imperialist system is becoming more and more moribund, concluding:
”The achievements and victories that the Filipino people are certain to gain in the coming period of revolutionary surge form part of the great resurgence of the international proletariat and people. Big and small, these revolutionary ripples are bound to create a big wave that will pound on imperialism, fascism and all reaction in all parts of the world.”
