struggle.
THE Spanish ruled the Philippines for three centuries up until 1898. During that time there were more than recorded against the occupying When, in 1896, revolution against Spanish rule broke out one of the main leaders of the rebellion was Anares Bonifacio - who established an organisation, the Katipunan, with a large base among the Philippines workers and peasants.
The 1896 revolution would have resulted in Philippine independence but for the intervention of U.S. troops, supposedly coming to aid the Filipino insurgents.
Under the treaty ending the Spanish War, Spain Philippines to the United States. When Filipino insurgents discovered that they had a new colonial ruler, they almost immediately resumed EneiT struggle against the U.S. colonisers.
Armed resistance to U.S. rule lasted from 1899 to 1913. U.S. troops killed hundreds of thousands of Filipinos before resistance to U.S. rule was finally crushed.
The backbone of the resistance was TIE FREDIVER! IN THE ELECTION LUS.
VUILES Marcos and the rigged election results THE OVERTHROW of Marcos, the large scale guerrilla war waged by the New People's Army, has focused world wide attention on the Philippines. But these events. are only the latest in a long history of struggle. The Philippines were ruled by Spain until 1898 and then, robbed of their independence, by the US until the end of World War II. But the Filipino people never ceased to resist foreign rule and those who collaborated with it. In that struggle it progressively built powerful organisations and parties of the working class and peasants. WILL REISSNER looks at the Philippines long history of made up Most OT the families uprisings the colonial authorities and prison in Barcelona and socialist ideas.
Reyes also brought back a work organizing Workers labour federation. ceded the movement strongly armed Key chants at this the eight - hour working day!' of peasants and workers. tion, wealtny in the Philippines quickly made their peace with the new colonial The first socialist literature made its way to the Philippines in 1901, carried in the luggage of Isabelo de los Reyes, a Workers. participant in the revolt against Spanish rule. De los Reyes had been arrested by sent to Spain. wine un prison he was introduced to anarchist Upon his return from exile, de los printing press, which proved invaluable in his the Democratic the colony's first From the beginning, the new labour pagating supported dependence for the Philippines. On 1 May, 1903, some 100,000 workers from Manila and its suburbs demonstrated in front of the colonial administration.
first Day demonstration in the Philippines were 'Down with American Imperialism!' 'We want freedom!' and 'We demand Through the arrest and conviction THEOIULAT FEB. 7, 1986 Canton, VKE• PRESIDEN pines. of its leader on charges of sedition and illegal association, the U.S. colonial authorities were able to destroy this first union federation.
In 1906 Crisanto Evangelista, who played a dominant role in the workers' movement until his execution by the Japanese in 1944, organised the Philippine Union of Printers (UIF), which adopted the slogan 'the emancipation of the workers must be achieved by the workers themselves.
The UIF played a key role in the formation of the Philippine Workers Congress (COF) on Mav Day 1913. Evangelista was director of COF from its formation, and became the federation's national secretary in 1924.
The first major peasant organisaPhilippine Sharecroppers was established in 1919, and three years later it expanded its scope and changed its name to the Philippine Confederation Sharecroppers Agricultural As the leader of the Philippine Workers Congress, Evangelista named labour representative in the first Philippine Independence Mission sent to the United States in 1919 to try to negotiate an end to U.S. colonial rule.
While in the United Evangelista met with U.S unionists and revolutionary socialists. He returned to the Philippines a committed Marxist Back home, Evangelista began proMarxist ideas within labour movement. In 1924 he was instrumental in forming the Workers the first working-class political organisation in the colony.
That same year, Filipino union leaders first came in contact with the Communist International. A leader of the U.S. Communist Party traveled to the Philippines to interest labour leaders in attending a conference in China, organized by the Pan Pacific Trade Union Secretariat of the Communist International (Comintern).
Five delegates from the Philippines attended the Canton conference. they met Ibrahim Datuk Tan Malaka, an Indonesian Communist leader who had been exiled from his homeland by the Dutch colonialists ruling that coun try, and invited him to visit the PhilipTan Malaka, the chief Comintern representative for Southeast Asis. rived in the Philippines in July 1925, and used it as his base of operations until 1927, when he was expelled from the colony following a sensational Hea case.
Philippines, Tan
developed close ties with Evangelista and other trade union leaders. months before Tan Malaka's expulsion from the Philippines, the Philippine Workers Congress affiliated to Comintern's pan Pacific Trade Union Secretariat.
Contacts with U.S. Communist Party leaders continued, and in March 1928 Evangelista and two other union leaders travelled to Moscow to attend a conference of the Red International of Labour Unions (Profintern).
Soon after Evangelista's return to the Philippines, the first group Filipino workers left for Moscow to study at the University of Toilers of the East, which had been established by the Communist International to provide Asian workers with a grounding i Marxist philosophy. In all, five group of Filipinos attended the school between 1928 and 1935.
In 1929 a split took place in the Philippine Workers'. Congress, pitting supporters of class collaboration and cooperation with U.S. authorities against advocates of class struggle and Filipino independence. Evangelista led the second which set up a new labour federation, the Association of the Sons of Sweat (KAP). The provisional conference of of was States, the Aquino supporters celebrate victory the KAP, held on 12 May 1929 was attended by representatives of 27 unions with a total membership of 80,000. That . There Party of the Philippines established on 26 August 1930, the anniversary of Andres Bonifacio's call for independence representative: of peasants' organisations took part in the tounding of the new party.
al -The founding of the PKP came at ine start or ine worlawide capitals depression of the 1930s. In the Philippines, 1930 was marked by continous working-class and peasant revolts and Malaka strikes.
Two months after the PKP's founTwo ding, a peasant uprising broke out in Tayug, as poor peasants struck out against oppression moneylenders, and land-grabbers.
The new party opened a nationa headquarters in Manila and began publishing its official organ, (Spark).
From the start, the repression from the authorities. On 14 September 1931, a Manila court declared the PKP and the KAP labour federation illegal. Twenty leaders of • the Evangelista, were sentenced to eight years' banishment in the provinces Most of them were not released until 31 December 1936, and received full pardons only two years after that.
the PKP and the KAP union federation underground, the destitution caused by the depression Filipinos to revolt.
During the early 1930s a tryside. Sakdalistas colonial vague ideas of socialism with fascist notions and pro-Japanese sentiments. But their main appeal to the peasantry group, flowed from their two basic demands:
immediate independence for the Philippines and an end to landlordism.
In 1935, the Sakdalistas mobilised Ene party, the Communist (PKP), was uprising Peasant Spain Sixty workers' enemy 'popular front' from the U.S.
DV landlords, Titis munist Party PKP faced U.S. colonia November, PKP, including Although the U.S repression forced continued to drive A combined pledged the 65,000 peasants to surround Manil and fought three battles with troops o Philippine Constabulary Wher this did not spark the hosed-forgenera against Sakdalista movement collapsed.
struggles however …Con tinued, as did rural organising by the underground PKP founded in 1932 under th leadership of Pedro Abad Santos.
By 1935 the Communist Interna tional, dominated by the bureaucrac in the Soviet Union, had abandoner the ultraleft policy it adopted in 1928 o viewing Social Democrats as the mair (describing them 'socia fascists'). Instead it began advocating:
with Socialist partie and bourgeois figures against fascism Under urging from representative . Communist Party, thi 'popular front' policy actually led t the merger of the PKP and the Socialis Party of Abad Santos in October 1938 The new party, called the Com of the Philippine (Merger of Communist and Socialis Parties)' was officially proclaimed on ional chairman, Abad Santos as vi chairman, and Guillermo Capadocia a general secretary All three remained in the leadershi of the new organisation until tł Japanese invasion of the Philippine during World War II With the June 1941 Nazi invasion o the Soviet Union, the PKP began cal ing for cooperation with U.S. colonia authorities against the German-Italian Japanese alliance.
12-point memorandum reistance to Japan submitted by th PKP to U.S. High Commissioner Fran cis Sayre in early December 1941 calle for a common resistance struggle an loyalty tot government of the Philippines and th United States.' This meant abandonin the struggle for independence.
When Japanese troops entere Manila on 2. January 1942, the tc
y of struggle leaders of the PKP remained in the city to organize resistance. But barely three weeks later, the Japanese secret police captured the entire first-line leadership of the party.
The arrest of Evangelista, Abad Santos, and Canadocia was a severe blow to the PKP. Evangelista was executed by the Japanese, and Abad Santos died in 1944 from the effects of his imprisonment.
A second-line leadership, headed by Dr. Vivente Lava, took over the reins of the PKP. Vivente was the first of three Lava brothers to lead the party.
Because the PKP had already expenencea a accade or unaerground and semi-underground existence by 1942, it was well-placed to lead the resistance to Javanese occupauor On 29 March 1942, the People's Army Against Japan, usually called the Huks, was organised under the leadership of the PKP.
In keeping, with its orientation toward an anti-Japanese alliance encompassing all classes, and its desire for a wartime alliance with the U.S. imslogans Anti-Japanese above all the PKP put forward slogan dissolved the mass peasant unions under its control in order to avoid the Filipino landowners.
The bulk of the Filipino landowners, however, actively cooperated with the Japanese occupation, had with the Spanish colonialists and the U.S. imperialists before.
Because of landlord collaboration with the Japanese, a form of class struggle continued to take place in Huk-controlled areas of the countryside - peasants refused to pay rents to landlords who collaborated with the Japanese authorities.
The Huks also tried to cooperate with the guerrilla organisations set up by U.S. officers who had been left behind in the Philippines to organise resistance to the Japanese. But in many instances these U.S.-organised forces carried out military attacks against the Huks.
Despite the U.S. hostility, the PKP and the Huks grew rapidly in size and influence during the Japanese occupaFor the first year of the struggle against the Japanese, the Huks waged a policy of continuous attacks. In March 1943, however, a sustained military drive against Huk strongholds central largest island in the Philippines.
The Huk leadership responded by breaking into small units and trying to slip through the Japanese encirclement. This policy, called retreat for defense,' was a disaster and led to the capture of many Huk troops and cadres.
In 1944, a PKP Central Committee meeting sharply criticized the retreat for defense policy Vicente Lava from the leadership. His place was taken by leader of the tobacco workers' union.
During the war the Huks fought 1,200 engagements with Japanese and Filipino puppet troops 25,000 casualties. had grown to 50,000 reservists.
The PKP leadership's policy of collaboration with U.S. forces against the Japanese occupation however had not prepared the ranks of the Huk guerrilla as they movement for the hostility with which they were treated by the returning U.S. military William Pomeroy, an with long ties to the PKP quently took part in the Huk postwar uprising. points out that as soon as U.S. armed forces had begun the reconquest of Luzon, in early 1945, they ar rested, on orders of General MacArthur, many top PKP and Huk leaders. sought to disarm Huk units, engineered the massacre of others, ousted provisional governments set up by the move. ment, and *began organised masses.
This U.S. assault disoriented the Huks. As Huk leader Luis Taruc noted in his 1953 autobiography Born of the People, nothing but praise for the Americans, and had done everything possible to bring about a pro-American feeling... had always Americans as our allies and had sincerely believed that under the leadership of Roosevelt the American nation would help usher in a new era of world peace and democracy.' in prison, Taruc concluded that the biggest shortcoming 'had been our failure to emphasize and to clarify the true meaning of imperialism to the people.
We had neglected to point out that imperialism Was the Japanese, American, British or Dutch.
In so doing we had narrowed down and weakened the basic issue of World War wartime Huk strongholds the peasant masses looked to the returning U.S. Army as liberators and were unprepared for the repression that soon followed.
from World War II with greater influence than when they entered it. 1945 the PKP organized a powerful National Peasants Union as well as a congress of Labour Organisations, controlled the unions in most of the industries in Manila.
Democratic Alliance elected six congressmen from Luzon to the first post-independence legislature.
The Democratice didates, however, were not allowed to take their seats. They were excluded in order to insure passage by the Philippine Congress ment to the which gave U.S. citizens identical rights with Philippine citizens in all spheres of the country's economic life. the Japanese launched Luzon, the and removed addition Democratic Alliance of its seats in conrearo castro, a gress, strongholds of central Luzon. During and inflicted the war, many of the landlords had fled to Manila and collaborated with the By 1945 the Huks 20,000 regulars and Japanese occupation. Now they wanted their land Dack mined to roll back reforms limiting rents PKP favoured focusing on legal and parliamentary struggle. many Huk veterans had already taken up arms to defend themselves from the army and landlords.
Political Bureau, American removed from the leadership. who subse- Lava, who favoured more emphasis on armed struggle, soon became de facto head of the party. ed struggle should be the central focus, and the old Huk forces were reorganized into the National Liberation Army (HMB).
early sucesses against the undisciplined terrorising the and demoralized troops, who were no match for the Huk veterans.
'throughout the war we had August, referred the guerrilla struggle.
Jose Lava Recalling reassesments made later recruitment would same whether fighters to 172,000.
Because of this policy, even in the when raids truckloads The PKP and the Huks emerged In of military which designed By 1954, In April 1946, the PKP-controlled Alliance canof the Parity AmendPhilippine Constitution, parliamentary struggle.
gle, however, contained return to civilian life' Jesus Lava.
to robbing the the new Filipino government launched an offensive against the Huk WCIC deterHuk agrarian The Pedro Castro leadership of the But by 1946 At a 1947 meeting of the PKP Pedro Castro was Jose In 1948, the PKP decided that armThe HMB guerrillas scored many In January 1950, the PKP leadership announced that the next two years 'would be decisive for the preparations for the seizure of power' On 29 March of the year - the eighth anniversary of the founding of the Huks - the HMB launched simultaneous attacks on 15 points in the island of Luzon. On 26 the 54th anniversary of the start of the war for independence was nam. marked by attacks on 11 towns.
With this new orientation, the PKP virtually abandoned all legal work and pulled its cadres out of the mass organizations in order to bolster the called for a massive drive to the PKP and HMB. Through 'geometric expansion' the PKP was predicted to grow from 3,500 members in July 1950 to 50,000 members by September 1951, while the expand from 10,800 The PKP's plans, however suffered a grievous setback on 18 October 1950, 22 places in Manila resulted in the capture of the entire Bureau as well as five ferent. of documents outlining plans for the military campaigns.
The capture of the Political Bureau, together with expanded US participation in the anti-Huk struggle, reversed the tide of the fighting. A combination campaigns by une Edward Lansdale, who later tried to duplicate his success in South Vietnam, dealt the HMB and PKP severe blows.
the counterinsurgency palace. campaign had broken the back of the HMB struggle although a few units would hold until 1968 when they formed the nucleus of the CPP's New People's Army (NPA).
Dr. Jesus Lava, who had replaced his brother Jose as leader of the PKP socially after Jose's arrest in the Manila raids, called for a shift from armed struggle to That shift to parliamentary strugwas cut short by the outlawing of the PKP in 1957. The lav La one-month grace period during which PKP and HMB members could register and avoid prosecution.
Jesus Lava urged party members to take advantage of the grace period to palace.
Lava also disbanded the PKP's cell structure, a move that led the CPP a decade later to charge that the PKP had in effect been liquidated in 1957.
With the party structure disbanded, all individual members were urged to act on their own initiative on the basis of 'political transmissions' issued by These "transmissions' were passed along from individual party member to party member under what was described as a new 'single file policy."
Jesus Lava himself was captured by the authorities in 1964. He remained in prison for more man a decdue While the PKP had largely drifted into inactivity following 1957, a new Philippine army units rally to Enrile Socialist Action 12 March 1986 generation of activists came to the fore in the early 1960s, mainly around the University of the Philippines in Manila. They were inspired by international events such as the Chinese and Cuban revolutions, the rise of the Sukarno government in Indonesia, the growing revolutionary struggle in VietSome joined the PKP. One of them, Jose Maria Sison, an English literature instructor at the University of the Philippines, was commissioned by the PKP to write a history of the party and guide for future activity.
Sison's draft sharply criticized Vicente Lava for the wartime strategy of 'retreat for defence, Jose Lava for the 1950 strategy, and Jesus Lava for his single- 'early seizure file' policy and liquidation of party cell structures Sison's criticisms of 'the Lava clique' led to his expulsion from the PKP in April 1967 and the subsequent formation of the CPP by those who agreed WILE HIS CERCISES When Ferdinand Marcos imposed martial law in 1972, the reactions of the PKP and CPP were fundamentally difTwo months after martial law was imposed, Jesus Lava, at that time still in prison, issued a 'political transmission' indicating that on balance martial law was not so bad because its main targets were Maoists and CIA-linked politicians like Benigno Aquino The PKP took a further step toward making peace with Marcos in October 1974, when members of its Political Bureau met with him at the presidential Felicisimo Macapagal, the PKP general secretary, told the Philippine dictator: Your excellency, you have called for national unity and we are here today in response to your call. We do so with an offer of patriotic and conscious participation nation-building which has long been denied us.' The PKP Political Bureau members symbolically turned over 19 weapons to Marcos to mark their commitment not to take up armed struggle.Since tha time, PKP leaders continued to be in vited to affairs at the presidential The CPP's reaction to martial law was very different. CP activists from the Manila student network took to the mountains to join the small group of NA members already waging armed The addition of these cadres enabled the CPP and NPA to build bases in a number of regions.
In fact, as the Far Eastern Economic noted on Nov. 1985, 'they have succeeded in forging a nationwide cell structure, something no previous revolt had been able to accomplish.' Although number of central leaders of the CPP, including Sison, were captured in 1976 and 1977, this loss did not stem the growth of the CPP-led insurgency.Today, the CPP's struggle is the most advanced guerrilla war in the whole of Asia.
LAST WEEK'S Soviet munist dominated by USSR's economy. Major changes were announced for agriculture. In other countries with nationalised economies, China, there have been moves in recent years in favour of introducing greater use of market mechanisms. A general awareness of the problems of the super centralised economy is JOHN ROSS looks background to economic reforms — and to Marxism's attitude to markets and planning.
The economic crisis confronting the USSR today is undoubtedly the most serious, outside war, For the first time since 1917 the USSR is actually falling the States in terms of the relative growth of the size of their economies.
According to US estimates, which are not unreliable, the Soviet economy progressively narrowed the gap in proauction DelweeT itselt economy up until 1975. Soviet production of all types by that year reached 58 per cent of the size of the US economy. By 1983 it had declined to 56 per cent. Today it is probably less than 54 per cent.
On the measure of net material product, which is roughly equivalent to the Socialist Action 12 March 1986 Comwas the Soviet notably sharp developing.
at the Gorbacher's since the 1920s.
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