Guerrillas mark founding day, torch Quezon high school

CAMP GUILLERMO NAKAR, Lucena, Quezon , Philippines  – Suspected New People’s Army guerrillas burned a school building in Catanauan town in Quezon province after midnight yesterday – the 41st anniversary of the Communist Party of the Philippines – even as a unilateral suspension of military operations against the rebel group was still in effect.

Chief Inspector Dwight Alegre, Catanauan police chief, said armed men torched the Doongan Ilaya National High School in Barangay Doongan Ilaya after midnight yesterday.

Alegre said barangay captain Emiliano Bibal and some teachers reported the incident hours later at 7 a.m.

He said there was no telephone service in the town where the school was located. The town itself is 16 kilometers from the police headquarters in Camp Nakar.

The rebels hoisted an inverted Philippine flag at the school’s flagpole before leaving the area, investigators said.

Malacañang ordered on Wednesday a unilateral suspension of offensive military operation (SOMO) against the NPA during the Christmas season.

The SOMO ended at noon yesterday.

The truce takes effect again on midnight on Dec. 31 until Jan. 1, 2010.

“That’s a pure violation of the true essence of the SOMO, it’s an act against not only the government but also against the people,” Chief Superintendent Perfecto Palad, Region 4-A police director, told The STAR.

On track versus Reds

Even as the communist insurgency marked its 41st anniversary yesterday, the military said it is on track in its objective of wiping out the group’s armed wing before the end of the term of President Arroyo.

“We have continued to gain headway in fulfilling our 2010 deadline in defeating the insurgency menace,” Armed Forces of the Philippines chief Gen. Victor Ibrado said.

“Your AFP has successfully constricted the insurgents’ pipelines of support and has significantly reduced their strength and influence,” Ibrado said.

From a high of 107 guerilla fronts in 2005, only 51 NPA fronts remain nationwide, mostly in the Bicol, Samar and Zamboanga areas.

“No longer will they (rebels) threaten our kababayan in Marinduque and Bohol. No longer will they be able to extort from businesses in Romblon, Leyte and Misamis,” Ibrado said.

These provinces had once been hotbeds of communist insurgency.

“These once threatened localities are now strongly denouncing the NPA’s violent ways,” he said.

“As a result of our success, your AFP has begun turning over internal security functions in these areas to the local governments peace and order councils and the police,” he said.

The military said it had dealt a major blow to NPA operations in the Rizal-Laguna area with the discovery and dismantling of a rebel munitions factory in Barangay Bagubong, Jala-jala, Rizal in October.

1Lt. Celeste Frank Sayson, spokesman for the Philippine Army’s 2nd Infantry Division, said communist rebels, out of desperation, even disguised themselves as members of the media when they attacked the San Narciso police station in Quezon several days ago.

“The attack directly endangered the lives of mediamen when they (NPA rebels) disguised as media,” Sayson said.

Sayson said that aside from battlefield setbacks, the rebel ranks dwindled due to leadership failure, corruption, discrimination against indigenous groups, and even “sexual opportunism.”

No NPA ‘harassment’

Meanwhile, there were no reports of violent incidents and harassment perpetrated by the NPA in Central Luzon after the end of the SOMO yesterday, said Superintendent Baltazar Mamaril, regional police office spokesman.

In a related development, Romy Halabaso of the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process said that while the government is determined to crush the insurgency, it has not wavered in its commitment to peace with the rebels.

“The Philippines renounces war as an instrument of national policy, adopts generally accepted principles as part of the law of the land, and adheres to the policy of peace, equality, justice, freedom and cooperation,” Halabaso told reporters on the sidelines of a peace-building forum at the Clark Freeport. - With Jaime Laude and Dino Balabo