Fernando Hicap, PAMALAKAYA chairperson (Photo from Manilatoday.net)
DAVAO CITY, Philippines—A group of fisher folks on Monday hit the 2018 proposed budget for the Department of National Defense ”because it lacks budget for external defense capabilities.”
In a statement, the Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang Mamamalakaya ng Pilipinas (PAMALAKAYA-Pilipinas) said DND’s P145 billion budget allocation will only be used for the government’s “repressive war campaigns” which include an all-out war and Martial Law in the island of Mindanao.
“Instead of developing our external defense capabilities, the government is more devoted to its self-declared war against its so-called internal threat which actually targets ordinary civilians on the ground,” Fernando Hicap, PAMALAKAYA chairperson said.
The defense department 2018 proposed budget, according to Hicap, should include the development of external defense in order “to uphold our territory and sovereignty against foreign intervention, particularly against China who continues to claim most part of the West Philippine Sea.”
Hicap also scored the Duterte administration because it lacks a concrete plan to modernize the country’s naval equipments and “to defend our sovereign rights from China’s illegal occupation and reclamation.”
He added that the increase in the Armed Forces’ fighting capabilities “should curtail the external threat rather than using it to intensify attacks against its own people under the banner of total war, war against drugs, and war on terror.”
“The budget for defense is obviously a coffer to step up state-perpetrated offensives against the Filipino people especially those who actively resist government’s repressive policies and laws. President Duterte downplays the evident threat to our national sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Hicap said.
The militant fisherfolk group said that “China has been imprudent in occupying our exclusive economic zone in the West Philippine Sea. It has now completely installed three military facilities in the Kalayaan Group of Islands.”
“China destroys our coral reefs and poses ecological disturbance to our marine biodiversity through its unrestrained reclamation activities. Where are President Duterte and his tamed soldiers to defend our sovereignty?” he asked. (davaotoday.com)
