Prof. Jose Maria Sison, Founding Chairman of the CPP, Ambassador Ture Lundh and GRP Presidential Adviser for Political Affairs Ronald Llamas after the December 18 meeting at the Hague, the Netherlands. (contributed photo by NDFP International Information Office)
Peace comes with a high price. It comes not just with a symbol of a dove and the signing of agreements. It comes with a commitment to achieve actual results through genuine and sincere reforms for the majority of the people.
By BEVERLY ANN S. MUSNI, YR.
Davao Today
Give peace a chance. That is what Beatle John Lennon said. For most, the concept of peace is a utopian dream. It is an idea, a figment of one’s imagination, a hope, a wishful thinking.
We delude ourselves to think that peace, with its warm embrace, will enfold us in its arms of perfect unity where there is no poverty, war and discrimination of race, sex and creed.
But peace, in all its essence of purity, comes with a price. It comes with the smell of blood and gunpowder. It comes with the taste of lies and hypocrisy. It comes with the pounding of fists on the negotiation table full of demands, arrogance and a fit of insanity.
In another bid of round for peace talks between the Government of the Philippines (GPH) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP), the GPH abruptly and unilaterally terminated it sans formal notice to the NDFP and even the Third Party Facilitator. They were vague in their reasons to call off the negotiations, citing the presentation of the NDFP’s agenda on national industrialization and land reform as “ideologically charged” concepts and outdated.
They might as well cited “irreconcilable differences” so as not to make their stand on the peace talks a laughing matter.
Whatever makes national industrialization and land reform a non-negotiable subject anyway? Isn’t this what our country needs? As far as I know, in economically stable countries, national industrialization was their main priority and strength making them powerful countries in the world today.
Land reform, on the other hand, should be the pillar of strength of the people. We are largely dependent on agriculture to survive. Unless President Noynoy Aquino and his cohorts are blind, or playing blind, to see that.
But that is beside the point. In disregarding genuine land reform in the negotiation rounds bespeak of the ignorance of Aquino or rather it confirms the selfishness of the Aquino-Cojuangco clan of big landlords and compradors who protect their own interests against the interests of the farmers and the majority of the people. This gravely speaks of the character of the GPH; how condescending it is to any attempt of peace process which does not cater to its interests.
With the GPH ending the peace talks, it proves them unworthy of being leaders of our country. In demanding the termination of the Hague Joint Declaration and all subsequent agreements demonstrates the GPH’s audacity to disregard and disrespect formal processes which was signed and sealed by both parties. It belies Aquino’s claim that he leads a ‘matuwid na daan,’ a contradiction of his Administration’s supposed banner that he is looking after the interest of the country and of the people.
If the President truly does give a damn about the state of chaos in our country, and if he is truly an intelligent man, then he should first lay the foundation of just and lasting peace and should address the root causes of the armed conflict. Basic social, political and economic reforms are the issues which need to be discussed, planned and accomplished.
These are not just simple conditions which the GPH can ignore. These are the grim realities which the Aquino administration has failed to act upon: genuine agrarian reform, environmental plunder, poverty, human rights violations and atrocities committed by the military through torture, disappearance and extrajudicial killings not only to the members of the NDFP consultants and peace panel but also to activists and journalists who seek and speak the truth about the cruelties of his administration.
In withdrawing from the negotiating table, the GPH has allowed itself to plunge directly into the pits of corruption by faking localized talks and presenting fake NPA surrenderees to the public in order to pocket at least PHP 45 Billion in the form of Conditional Cash Transfer and Pamana funds.
The GPH further demanded that there should be an indefinite ceasefire, directly violating The Hague Joint Declaration which stipulates the agenda to end hostilities as the final agreement after the creation and the action upon the agreements based on social, economic, political and constitutional reforms.
Since March 1998, after both parties have signed the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law, the NDFP has submitted their Draft of a Comprehensive Agreement on Social and Economic Reform. This is a task which requires both parties to fully lay down the agenda on the table which would help speed the peace process.
But until now, the GPH has failed to materialize their draft, deliberately defying the agreement and causing utter disrespect to the peace process as a whole. Thus, the GPH’s demand which insists on a unilateral ceasefire without even presenting and submitting to the negotiating panels their Draft displays the blatant disregard of the welfare of the people and depriving us a chance to have a true, just and lasting peace.
You cannot demand in exchange for something that you yourself did not do. It basically transgresses the law of fair play and equality in dealing with human beings. It is a reflection of ignorance, of conceit, of shrewdness, of bull-headedness and stupidity.
But despite all the pointless excuses that Aquino and the GPH had come up regarding its termination of the peace process, the NDFP is still open and willing to go forward with the peace process. They are still committed to undertake this task in upholding and promoting peace and laying down valid and specific grounds for real socio-political-economic reforms which would benefit both parties and their constituents.
Peace comes with a high price. It comes not just with a symbol of a dove and the signing of agreements. It comes with a commitment to achieve actual results through genuine and sincere reforms for the majority of the people.
Give peace a chance, as what the Beatle John Lennon said. But I doubt Aquino even knows what peace is and its real meaning. And I doubt he even knows what he is doing to our country.
Beverly Ann S. Musni, Yr. is a free spirit. She is a wanderlust, a dreamer and a frustrated rock star who dreams of travelling the world one day. She is a world peace advocate.
gph, ndfp, Peace Negotiations, peace talks
