NPA ATROCITIES. Datu James Binayao, head of the Manobo Talaandig tribe, tells members of the media about the atrocities committed by the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People's Army-National Democratic Front (CPP-NPA-NDF) against the different tribal communities in Mindanao, during the "Usapang Pangkapayapaan, Usapang Pangkaunlaran" organized by the Air-7 of the Philippine Air Force at the Mactan Benito Ebuen Air Base on Thursday (Oct. 17, 2019). Binayao appealed to "big corporations" in the country to stop giving "revolutionary taxes" to the communist rebels as the money is used to buy firearms and bullets to kill indigenous peoples like them. (PNA photo by John Rey Saavedra)
LAPU-LAPU CITY, Cebu – Leaders of different tribal communities from Mindanao have barnstormed this province to educate Cebuanos about the 17 atrocities of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front (CPP-NPA-NDF) against the indigenous cultural communities in southern Philippines.
Datu Nestor Apas, leader of the Langilan Manobo tribe in Davao del Norte, said they will continue telling Filipinos about the violence the communist rebels have done to them in the past decades in order to stop their deceptive propaganda against the government.
Apas accompanied other IP leaders in visiting Cebu to speak with the Cabinet Officers for Regional Development and Security (CORDS) during their summit in Cebu City with the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) on Wednesday, and in an advocacy forum with the students of the Philippine State College of Aeronautics (Philsca) here and the Usapang Pangkapayapaan, Usapang Pangkaunlaran organized by the Air-7 of the Philippine Air Force at the Mactan Benito Ebuen Air Base on Thursday.
“We have a covenant. That Indigenous Peoples Rights Act of 1997 or Republic Act 8371 is a covenant between the Government of the Philippines and the Indigenous People. Last year, we gathered together to discuss the different acts of the CPP-NPA-NDF that affects us, the IPs in Mindanao. And we came up with that 17 atrocities,” Apas said in Cebuano during the PAF event here.
According to him, the 17 atrocities of the CPP-NPA-NDF against them contributed to the idea of forming the NTF-ELCAC through President Rodrigo Duterte’s Executive Order no. 70 signed in December 2018.
He thanked Duterte for organizing the task force which, he viewed, as an effective way to end the atrocities of the communist rebels against the different IP communities in Mindanao.
Datu James Binayao, a leader of the Manobo Talaandig tribe, illustrated to the media and students of Philsca how the CPP utilized them in strengthening their armed wing and in collecting funds from European non-government organizations (NGOs).
During the Usapang Pangkapayapaan, Usapang PangPangkaunlaran forum at the airbase, Binayao appealed to the “big corporations” to stop paying “revolutionary taxes” to the CPP-NPA.
“Tingnan natin baka puedeng maputol ang kanilang suporta sa CPP-NPA… Kasi hanggang kalian ka pa magbibigay sa CPA-NPA? Hanggang kalian mo ba titiisin ang milyon-milyon na binibigay mo sa kanila? Kung alaman mo lang sana na ang ang pera na binibigay mo ay binibili nila ng armas, binibili ng mga bala na ang mga IP rin ang napapatay (Let’s see if it’s possible for them to cut their support with the CPP-NPA… Until when will you be giving to the CPP-NPA? Until when will you bear the millions that you give to them? If they know that the money, they give them are used to buy firearms and bullets that kill IPs),” Binayao said.
He said those who are giving aid to the communist rebels are, in a way, helping them to kill the tribespeople in Mindanao.
However, Binayao said big companies, who are paying revolutionary taxes to the rebels, could not be faulted as they just want to secure their businesses.
Meanwhile, Datu Awing Apuga, leader of Ata Manobo Talaingod Tribe, urged fellow IPs who are still in the mountains fighting with the NPA rebels to go down and go back to the fold of the law.
Apuga said they should stop fighting the government and unite with them instead to work for national development.
Apas, Binayao and Apuga are just a few of the IPs who went to the United States and Europe to tell the people there about the different atrocities of the CPP-NPA, which, according to them, have resulted in the cancellation of funding assistance from non-government organizations in Belgium.
Among the 17 atrocities they listed and presented during their advocacy fora here are the communist insurgents' involvement in the murders of some 1,000 IP leaders since the 1980s; collecting revolutionary taxes from farmers, sari-sari stores and habal-habal drivers; and setting up informal schools for elementary and high school education in their ancestral domains like the Salupungan schools which graduates became NPA fighters.
They also complained about agitating and deceiving IP leaders and members with false promises to go “bakwit” or evacuate from ancestral lands to town centers or cities and preventing them from going out; bringing their young, intellectual leaders to tertiary schools as scholars and radicalizing them; and making some IP leaders heads of Organs of Political Power and the Kangaroo Court to decide cases against IP leaders and members, who would be executed.
The tribesmen also revealed about the NPA subverting “Bagani”, the term they use for their warriors to protect their own but used as NPA units to kill their own IP members; occupying ancestral domains without their permission; removing their rights of suffrage and issuing permit to campaign and permit to win for the politicians, and collecting revolutionary taxes from mining and logging companies, among others.
In February this year, National Security Council Deputy Director General Vicente Agdamag handed over to Ambassador Evan P. Garcia, Philippine Permanent Representative to the United Nations and other International Organizations in Geneva, the documents containing the official complaints of the different tribal communities represented by the Mindanao Indigenous People Council for Peace and Development pertaining to the 17 atrocities committed by the CPP-NPA-NDF.
https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1083511
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