(UPDATE – 2:09 p.m.) The government is facing not a “large scale” challenge by any armed group but “pockets of rebellion everywhere,” President Rodrigo Duterte said Friday even as he thumbed down an offer by communist rebels to help fight extremists.
He also reiterated an earlier demand that “either we continue to talk about peace (with the communists) but we have to stop fighting.”
With the battle between government forces and gunmen from the Maute and Abu Sayyaf groups in Marawi City well into its second week, he also predicted victory against extremism but warned that “we will have losses.”
Duterte declared the whole of Mindanao under martial law after fighting broke out in Marawi on May 23, saying it was necessary to quell a rebellion by the Maute group.
Lately, however, government and military officials have also been invoking an “invasion,” citing foreign extremists fighting alongside their local counterparts.
“You know, we’re having really, hindi naman (not really) rebellion of a large scale. But we have pockets of rebellion everywhere,” Duterte told troops of the 102nd Infantry Brigade in Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay.
He said he had shown military officers what he described as a written offer from National Democratic Front of the Philippines chief negotiator Fidel Agcaoili “to fight alongside with us against terrorism.”
“Sumulat sa akin si Agcaoili (Agcaoili wrote me),” was how he described it.
“But I’m not so keen about it. Anyway, it’s a show of goodwill,” Duterte said.
Sought for reaction, Agcaoili denied having written Duterte to offer the rebels’ help.
He said the offer to help fight the Maute group was contained in an earlier statement in which he urged the government panel to return to the negotiating table after they refused to participate in the fifth round of talks in The Netherlands, supposed to start May 26 because of an order from the Communist Party of the Philippines for the New People’s Army to intensify attacks in the wake of Duterte’s declaration of martial law.
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Duterte surmised that the NDFP made the offer after “they realized na kung … we are overwhelmed at manalo, the ISIS will prevail in Mindanao or even a part of Mindanao, wala silang kasali sa gobyerno (if … we are overwhelmed and the Islamic State will prevail in Mindanao or even a part of Mindanao, they will have no part in the government).”
Agcaoili also said it was ironic for Duterte to demand a rebel ceasefire declaration before agreeing to resume the talks when Defense Secretary Delfin “Lorenzana’s call for all-out war against the revolutionary movement continues to wreak havoc on communities through aerial bombardments and artillery fire, leading to civilian deaths, destruction to property and the internal displacement of tens of thousands of people, excluding those from Marawi. ”
He cited recent incidents in Compostela Valley and Bukidnon where human rights organizations have reported lumad recently killed in alleged military operations.
“These bombing runs and artillery fire are meant to soften the ground for the military to go and occupy communities, conduct interrogation and arrest,” he said.
Duterte also threatened to arrest Philippine-based NDFP negotiators and consultants on their return to the country despite an existing agreement granting them immunity for the duration of the talks.
But the rebel negotiator said Duterte was hyping the release of NDFP consultants when “out of the list of 432 political prisoners that we submitted … at the beginning, only 36 have been released, including the 17 consultants released in August 2016 of which the regime has been so proud of.”
He noted that the number of released detainees is “less than … (the) total number of political prisoners arrested by the (Duterte) regime since it came to power,” citing reports from the human rights group Karapatan.
“So how can we declare a unilateral ceasefire without a simultaneous and reciprocal unilateral ceasefire declaration by them? And how can we declare these simultaneous unilateral ceasefires if there are no talks between the GRP and the NDFP?” he asked.
As for victory against the extremists, Duterte said the government was “bound by rules and even treaties” such as the Geneva Conventions.
Nevertheless, he promised to acquire more new and modern planes, sea craft and equipment for the military and would no longer accept secondhand acquisitions from the Americans “even if I have to spend double the money.”
