The military claims the NPA is now down to around 2,000 regular fighters, from a high of 25,000 in the 1980s
The good news for Mindanao is that the national government plans to spend P1.2 trillion for infrastructure over the next six years.
According to Finance Secretary Benjamin Diokno, the administration is committed to provide resources for Mindanao’s infrastructure requirements to boost economic growth in the island.
Based on the Public Investment Program (PIP), 35 percent or 1,310 out of the 3,770 priority programs and projects of the government will be located in Mindanao over the course of the Marcos administration.
The planned investments will be on top of at least 30 out of the 194 high-impact infrastructure flagship projects that will support economic growth in Mindanao.
These include the Mindanao Railway, Samal Island-Davao City Connector, Cagayan de Oro Coastal Road, Davao City Expressway, and preparations for the new Zamboanga Airport, Bukidnon Airport, and Siargao Sayak Airport.
The infrastructure boost for Mindanao is part and parcel of the government effort to sustain the annual infrastructure spending at five to six percent of the economy.
The basic idea, according to the Finance Department, is to link and integrate markets, connect urban centers to rural areas, and facilitate the movement of people and goods to expand access to more opportunities for local industries. Ultimately, all this will boost productivity.
The Mindanao projects will be financed by various development partners through official development assistance (ODA), general appropriations, and public-private partnerships (PPPs).
As of end 2022, there were 97 active or ongoing ODA-loan and grant funded projects and programs being implemented in Mindanao.
There are also 35 ongoing projects with total loan and grant commitments of $4.2 billion from bilateral and multilateral development partners.
The DOF has likewise committed to assist Mindanao in its implementation of the Brunei Darussalam-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area (BIMP-EAGA) Vision 2025 to make Mindanao a key economic driver in the sub-region.
In the past, Mindanao had often been described as the “Land of Opportunity” or the “Land of Promise.”
But it seems that many of its people were neglected by their political leaders and therefore denied the opportunity to improve their lives.
Worse, they were promised deliverance from grinding poverty yet remained destitute and unable to make both ends meet.
The Marcos administration’s enhanced infrastructure program will, we hope, give the people of Mindanao what they truly deserve: a much improved quality of life and a better future.
The end of the road for the insurgency?
If recent news reports are accurate, it would appear the armed rebellion that began in 1969 with the founding of the Maoist New People’s Army is slowly but steadily winding down with successive battlefield losses.
The series of encounters between government troopers from the 62nd Infantry Battalion and the rebels took place in two towns in Negros Occidental on May 20.
In the two encounters, the NPA suffered five casualties. There were no fatalities on the part of the government soldiers.
The soldiers launched combat operations in response to information regarding the presence of the rebels in the towns of Moises Padilla and La Castellana.
Recovered from the rebels were an M-16 rifle, two .38 caliber pistols, a KG9 machine pistol with a magazine assembly, one UZI machine pistol with a magazine assembly, two homemade 12-gauge shotguns, assorted ammunition, and an NPA flag, the 62nd IB said.
The recent encounters in Negros Occidental come close on the heels of similar clashes in other parts of the country, such as Quezon and Northern Samar provinces.
The military claims the NPA is now down to around 2,000 regular fighters, from a high of 25,000 in the 1980s. The number of their guerrilla fronts has also been whittled down to just two.
If this is the case, then the military’s projection of putting an end to the armed rebellion within the year may yet be on the horizon.
The NPA, after all, is led by the Communist Party of the Philippines, whose founder, Jose Ma. Sison, died from natural causes in December last year.
Key leaders, including the husband-and-wife tandem of Benito and Wilma Tiamzon, were killed somewhere in Samar island even earlier.
Others are now in jail or have been killed in military operations, leaving the rebel movement in the hands of a younger set of cadres who apparently have managed to survive intense military operations in recent years.
(Email: ernhil@yahoo.com)