The GPH is responsible for prolonging the Peace Negotiations through long interruptions and violations of agreements

PRESS STATEMENT

By Fidel V. Agcaoili

Spokesperson, NDFP Negotiating Panel

19 August 2011

**The GPH is responsible for prolonging the Peace Negotiations through
long interruptions and violations of agreements**

Atty. Alexander Padilla, Chairperson of the Negotiating Panel of the
Government of the Philippines (GPH, formerly designated as the GRP),
has the penchant for blaming the National Democratic Front of the
Philippines (NDFP) of among others prolonging the GPH-NDFP peace
negotiations supposedly for 25 years since 1986.

What are the facts as reflected in the time line study of the GPH-NDFP
peace negotiations?

There were no peace negotiations during the Cory Aquino regime. There
were merely ceasefire negotiations which resulted in a short-lived
Ceasefire Agreement. The negotiating panels of both sides were still
trying to hammer out an agenda for peace negotiations when the
massacre of peasants calling for genuine land reform occurred on 22
January 1987 and the ceasefire broke down. The massacre was followed
by the “unsheathing of the sword of war” by Mrs. Aquino in March
1987.

It took more than five (5) years and six (6) months after March 1987
before The Hague Joint Declaration (THJD) was signed on 1 September
1992. This should have led to further preparations for the opening of
the GPH-NDFP peace negotiations but Ramos in self-contradiction
created the National Unification Commission to prevent such
preparations.

It was only in 1994 when the GPH formed its negotiating panel to
engage its NDFP counterpart in further preliminary talks and forge,
among others, the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees
(JASIG) and the Joint Agreement on the Formation, Sequence and
Operationalization of the Reciprocal Working Committees (RWCs).

These agreements, together with The Hague Joint Declaration, paved the
way for the opening of the formal peace negotiations on 26 June 1995
in Brussels, Belgium upon the facilitation of the Belgian Government.
Strictly speaking, the GPH-NDFP peace negotiations started sixteen
years ago, not 25 years ago.

>From 1 September 1992 (signing of THJD) to 15 February 2011 (opening
of the formal talks under the Benigno Aquino III regime), there were
only 34 interface meetings in formal and informal talks between the
GPH and NDFP negotiating panels which involved a total of 128 days.
There were also the normal recesses in between rounds of formal talks
which totaled around eleven months.

On the other hand, there have been 12 interruptions, all of which were
at the instance of the GPH except for one by the NDFP. This was in
August 2004 when the NDFP postponed the formal talks scheduled on that
month to give time for the GPH to comply with its obligations under
THJD, the JASIG, the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human
Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL) and the 2004
First and Second Oslo Joint Statements. 2

Among the major interruptions initiated by the GPH from 1992 to 2011
were:

The nearly two (2) years of interruption (1 September 1992 till June
1994) imposed by the Ramos regime after the formation of the National
Unification Commission (NUC) on 16 September 1992.

After the appointment of Howard Dee as the GPH negotiating panel
chairperson, he caused further interruptions by unilaterally making
declarations of suspension, indefinite recess and collapse which
totaled almost two (2) years, including a one year suspension (June
1995 to June 1996) because Gen. Renato de Villa refused to release
Sotero Llamas, a Document of Identification (DI) holder under the
JASIG.

The more than two (2) years of interruption instigated by the Joseph
Estrada regime when it suspended the peace negotiations on 24 February
1999 and officially terminated these on 31 May 1999 and declared
all-out-war against the revolutionary movement (the termination ended
in March 2001).

A total of more than eight (8) years of suspension (from September
2001 to September 2003 and from December 2004 to December 2010) by the
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo regime when it tried to defeat and/or render
irrelevant the revolutionary movement by carrying out military
suppression campaigns in the countryside and urban areas, accompanied
by widespread and systematic violations of human rights against
residents of communities and members of legal democratic
organizations, through Oplan Bantay Laya I and II.

These four major interruptions come to a total of 14 years (excluding
the five years and six months during the Cory Aquino regime). Together
with other GPH interruptions, more than 21 years were wasted by the
GPH since 1987 in attempting to resolve the armed conflict in the
country militarily and to impose its will on the NDFP across the
negotiating table.

The GPH should comply with all signed agreements in the GPH-NDFP peace
negotiations instead of raising irrelevant issues to avoid obligations
under, or worse, negate these agreements. Only for the second time in
June 2011 did the NDFP call for the postponement of formal talks
between the negotiating panels because the GPH failed to fulfill its
obligation to release all or most of the 17 JASIG-protected
individuals before said month. The recurrent problem is that the GPH
does not fulfill its obligation and comply with agreements.

The NDFP has no interest in prolonging the peace negotiations. It
recognizes the military superiority of the GPH in terms of personnel
and resources and the harm that such power has been wreaking on the
people in the countryside and urban areas. But the Filipino people
must continue to defend themselves against the violence of the
reactionary state, hold their destiny in their own hands, and fight
for an independent, democratic, just, progressive and prosperous
Philippines.

The GPH must exercise strong political will in addressing the roots of
the armed conflict. It must agree to carry out basic social, economic
and political reforms in the country. The GPH must exhibit patriotism,
if it has any, and must respect the national and democratic rights and
interests of the Filipino people, especially in these times of grave
crisis which goads the people to resist. It should formally reply to
the proposal of the NDFP for a round of formal talks in Oslo in
September 2011 and to the offer of truce and alliance on the basis of
the ten-point Concise Agreement for an Immediate Just Peace.