The Communist Party of the Philippines and the entire Filipino people condemn in the strongest possible terms the Aquino regime’s contemptuous puppetry in the case of the Jennifer Laude killing.
The Aquino government immediately buckled in the face of the US’ outright denial of its “request” to cede to Philippine authorities custody over US Marine Lance Corporal Joseph Scott Pemberton, who has been accused of killing Laude. The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) very meekly accepted the US embassy’s response regarding Pemberton. Worse, it even served as a US apologist in saying that the rejection was well within the rights of the US under the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) and that it would not appeal the decision.
Even more enraging were the other contents of the US’ response to the DFA. Aside from refusing to give up custody over Pemberton, the embassy virtually ordered the DFA to inform all government agencies of the Philippines, whether national or local, that the US decision on Pemberton would prevail.
In one fell swoop, all pretensions to sovereignty and equality were banished. The US tyrannically wielded its power as imperialist master in commanding its puppet, with the DFA immediately playing the grovelling servant. Malacañang conveniently avoided trouble by saying that the matter was now in the hands of the court.
Benigno Aquino III’s regime has once more demonstrated its utter inability to promote and protect the Filipino people’s interests. Instead, it betrays the Filipino people by entering into unequal agreements and enforcing policies and laws that are inimical to Philippine interests not just in the military but in the economic, political and cultural arenas. Through the Aquino regime’s subservience in this matter, it not only shows contempt for, and tramples on, the rights of the Laude family, it likewise violates the rights and dignity of the entire Filipino people.
The developments surrounding the Laude case are a learning experience for the people. They provide excellent opportunities for the people to expand their knowledge and deepen their understanding of the brutal history of the US imperialist occupation of the country.
The Filipino people must grasp that Laude’s killing is but the latest of countless crimes committed by American soldiers against the Philippines and against Filipinos. They must remember that up to 1,400,000 Filipinos were killed during the US war of subjugation against the Philippines from 1898 to 1913.
A century before the US used unbridled brutality in conquering Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya in the 2000s, and half a century before it occupied Vietnam, US imperialism had already perpetrated unspeakable atrocities in its conquest of the Philippines. Long before the US military employed “waterboarding” in its military camp at Guantanamo Bay, it was already using “water torture” extensively by pouring sea water into the nostrils of bound “insurgents”—the term it used for Filipinos who refused to surrender to its power.
US imperialism has systematically wiped out the bloody chapter of the US occupation of the Philippines from the consciousness of succeeding generations of Filipinos in its desire to eliminate the fires of patriotism and strip Filipinos of all vestiges of national dignity. It must therefore be systematically restored to the consciousness of the new generation of Filipino youth in order to rekindle patriotic fervor and the desire to militantly struggle for national freedom and independence.
The study of US colonial and neocolonial rule in the Philippines will likewise enable Filipinos to realize that Benigno Aquino III is but the latest in an unbroken line of puppet presidents who have betrayed Philippine interests and sovereignty.
Such knowledge must be transformed into a people’s movement demanding the immediate abrogation of all unequal military accords such as the VFA, the Mutual Defense Treaty and the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA). The Filipino people must likewise translate their gathering rage into a powerful movement for the ouster of the Aquino regime for its utter puppetry. An abjectly craven president who allows himself to act like flotsam in the face of the heinous violations committed by a foreign power to Philippine sovereignty, interests and dignity has no right to remain in power.
[Ang Bayan is the official
news organ of the Communist Party of the Philippines
http://www.philippinerevolution.net/publications/ang_bayan/20141221/resist-the-us-overweening-arrogance-under-the-vfa
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