By WENDELL VIGILIA
Malaya
Dec. 15, 2006

A MOVE to revive the anti-subversion law is part of President Arroyo’s “ominous plan to extend her stay in power,” Rep. Teodoro Casiño said yesterday as he warned of massive rallies against the plan.

Casiño, of the party list group Bayan Muna, and other Leftist lawmakers said President Arroyo’s support for the move exposes her intolerance of legitimate dissent and her desire to declare martial law.

Senators crossed party lines in vowing to block the revival of the law.

Staunch administration ally Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago said provisions of the Revised Penal Code on insurrection, sedition, and inciting sedition, and the anti-terror law (Human Security Act of 2007) provide enough protection for the state against rebels and subversives.

Last Thursday, Arroyo said she was supporting a bill to be filed by Rep. Jose Solis (Sorsogon) seeking to revive the anti-subversion law as a tool to help end the communist insurgency.

Republic Act 1700, which punishes membership in the Communist Party of the Philippines, was repealed in 1992 through a measure authored and defended by then Batangas congressman and now Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita.

Ermita last March told the Communist Party of the Philippines to denounce its armed wing, the New People’s Army, and renounce violence if it does not want the anti-subversion law revived.

Arroyo has vowed to get rid of the communist rebels before she steps down in 2010.

Presidential adviser on the peace process Jesus Dureza, who was with the President in Masbate where she made the statement, said the proposed law is not an initiative of Arroyo. It has not been discussed in any of the meetings in Cabinet.

“If Congress will pass it, it’s okay with her. My take of that statement is that Congress crafts and approves laws and she will go along with what Congress decides so. It was not President Arroyo’s own plan or intention at the time that cropped up and candidly, we have not discussed it,” he said.

Chief presidential legal counsel Sergio Apostol said it would be timely to come up with a new anti-subversion law which would specify groups that pose a threat against government.

He said mere revival of R.A. 1700 is not enough.

“We have to modify, so it will not be against the communists only…We could add some groups… iyung may mga threats sa government and those that continue to do subversive things,” he said.

Rep. Satur Ocampo of Bayan Muna said: “Mrs. Arroyo ought to rethink her mindless support for reviving the anti-subversion law, which the dictator Marcos used to arrest and detain tens of thousands without charges under martial law but failed to defeat the CPP-NPA.”

BACKPEDALING

Ocampo, former spokesman of the National Democratic Front, said the President showed her true colors, quickly making a 180-degree turn from her Human Rights Day statement to stop extrajudicial killings.

“After announcing the other day that she is aiming for ‘zero political violence’ and work with Congress to enact new laws to ‘protect’ human rights, she already backpedaled in less than 24 hours,” he said.

Ocampo said the law’s revival will not solve the insurgency problem and “will only lead to massive warrantless arrests, searches and seizures, illegal detention, and worsen the sorry state of human rights in the country.”

IMPOSSIBLE TARGET

Ocampo surmised Arroyo’s real intention “is to have another draconian law aside from the HSA to back her “impossible target to defeat the revolutionary movement by 2010.”

Rep. Roilo Golez (Ind., Parañaque), a deputy minority leader, said the repeal of R.A. 1700 is “irreversible.”

“We cannot ban ideology. We compete with it in the free market of ideas and prove that espousing capitalism and democracy is better for the country than being a member of the CPP,” he said.

CONTRADICTION

Golez, former national security adviser, said one of the first initiatives of former President Fidel V. Ramos, who spent almost his entire military career enforcing the anti-subversion law, was to work for its repeal.

“How could the Arroyo administration now move for the restoration of the anti-subversion law? That would be a great reversal and contradiction,” Golez said.

He said Ramos succeeded in reducing the size of the NPA “to its lowest level in recent history” and dramatically improved the economy without the anti-subversion law.

“We should not restore a draconian martial law instrument,” he said.

STEP BACKWARD

Santiago said the revival of the anti-subversion law “is a step backward.”

“Under the anti-subversion law, mere membership is punishable, and that would be unconstitutional because it would impinge on the constitutionally protected right of freedom of assembly and association,” she said.

She said the proposal would be blocked immediately by the Senate “because of the constitutional issues that it raises.”

“These two chambers of the legislature are very sensitive to public opinion, and I think it is indefensible to be able to arrest and prosecute a person just because he or she is a member of a political group. That is antidemocratic,” she said.

Senate majority leader Francis Pangilinan said the anti-subversion law had been around 40 years. “It didn’t work… reviving it now won’t make it work… poverty alleviation and sustained economic activity coupled with aggressive peace initiatives with all warring factions to end the root causes of poverty, dissent and injustice…”

Sen. Francis Escudero said reviving the law is a “step backward” and a surefire way to earn enemies.

DROP IDEA

Sen. Mar Roxas urged the Arroyo administration to drop the idea. “Reviving the anti-subversion law is to turn the hands of time to an era where might is right, and freedom is defined not by one’s ability to think and act freely, but by espousing only the ideas and actions that were most acceptable to the powers-that-be,” he said.

He said the problem of insurgency, the longest running in Asia, is a product of poor governance, widespread injustice, and too much corruption.

Sen. Loren Legarda said reducing if not eliminating poverty is the ultimate solution to the drawn-out insurgency problem, not the return of the anti-subversion law.

“An anti-subversion law would just force people’s organizations to go underground. It would further swell the ranks of those who see armed struggle as the only remaining option to effect change,” she said.

RETROGRESSIVE

Senate President Manuel Villar said there is no need to resurrect the “entombed” law. He said existing laws such as the Human Security Act already provide adequate protection for the State.

“Reviving R.A. 1700 is retrogressive. It is like going back to the primitive years when we label people as ‘communists’ and ‘insurgents’ It will be a throwback to the jurassic era when mere membership in a group was ground for punishment when what should be sanctioned are overt illegal acts and not mere organizational affiliation,” he said.

Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz said insurgency will remain in existence even if a new anti-subversion law is passed.

“The insurgency in the Philippines is ideological, meaning an ideology dies only with the death of the ideologue,” Cruz said.

TOUGHER LAWS

Last Tuesday, AFP chief Gen. Hermogenes Esperon said communist guerrilla forces will be significantly reduced by 2009, or a year ahead of Arroyo’s deadline.

Esperon said he favors tougher laws to help crush 40 years of communist rebellion, favoring legislation similar to the internal security acts enforced elsewhere in Southeast Asia.

He said Philippines has a weak legal system that allows communists and other dissident groups to take advantage of the democratic space.

In an interview after presiding over the graduation of Command and General Staff College class 49 in Camp Aguinaldo, he said:

“I support a new anti-subversion law. It is the duty of the government to protect its citizens and if, indeed, they (rebels) are only after political reforms, then, they can go to the negotiating table,” he added.

Esperon said a new anti-subversion law should not only involve CPP/NPA members but also people who are seen with armed rebels, and people or organizations whose campaign materials are recovered in clashes with the rebels.

When asked if mere membership with the communist movement should be punishable by the new anti-subversion law, Esperon said: “Not really mere membership but it’s more on the actions like when you are seen with armed groups. Or when you are, for example, campaigning and armed groups join you and when your campaign materials are recovered in encounters,” he said.

Esperon said coming up with a new anti-subversion law does not in any way affect the possible resumption of peace talks with the communists. Formal negotiations between the government and the communists bogged down in 2004 following the US classification of the CPP and the NPA as foreign terrorist organizations. – With JP Lopez, Jocelyn Montemayor, Gerard Naval, Anthony Ian Cruz, Victor Reyes and Reuters