BAYOMBONG, Nueva Vizcaya – The Aquino administration still has to contend with around 5,000 New People’s Army (NPA) fighters in its efforts to finally find lasting peace and a solution to the four-decade-old communist insurgency.
According to the Armed Forces of the Philippines’ (AFP) Northern Luzon Command (Nolcom) based at Camp Aquino, Tarlac City, the strength of the communist combatants has been decimated by almost half, from 9,260 in 2002 to 4,642 as of the first quarter of 2010.
Likewise, Major Rosendo Armas, head of the Nolcom’s 1st civil-relations group, claimed that communist-influenced villages also dwindled to 1,017 or 2.4 percent of the country’s 42,025 barangays from 2,395 eight years ago or a year after President Arroyo took the helm of the government.
However, despite the communists’ weakened strength and influence, the Nolcom, in adherence to the call of the new administration, said it is still open to peace talks with the insurgents as a lasting solution to peace and progress.
But amid the government’s call for resumption of peace talks with the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front (CPP-NPA-NDF), its guerillas continued to mount attacks in the countryside, including that of last month’s ambush slay of seven soldiers in Mt. Province, the Army said.
This was followed a week later by another NPA-staged ambush on police personnel while on their way to respond to reports of a robbery in progress in Isabela’s Benito Soliven town.
The Army said that the rebels also resort to burning private heavy equipment in the countryside like what they did recently to the trucks and bulldozers of the Monte Alto logging firm also in Isabela.
“This is one of the strategies (the CPP-NPA) uses to make their presence felt despite their waning strength, membership and influence. The (NPA) already lacks the capability to fight government troops on equal ground,” Armas said in a statement. - By Charlie Lagasca
