"In this time of extreme hardship, does it really matter very much who is providing the aid?"
We have to hand it to Lt General Antonio Parlade Jr, the spokesman of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict. In an interview with a radio station, he called the senators stupid for wanting to defund the NTF-ELCAC. I have never seen this happen before and he appears to have gotten away with it. Apart from an order for him to keep his mouth shut, no further action was taken. Even Senator Panfilo Lacson who at one time advocated for his replacement also treated his insulting remarks lightly. He is of course, entitled to his opinion but public officials normally do not go around calling the senators stupid if their agency’s budget is hanging on the balance.
As a consequence, a resolution is being filed by Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon to censure Parlade. Fifteen senators have apparently signed this already. The senators, however, do not seem to have a unified stand on what to do with the huge NTF-ELCAC budget of P19.2 billion.
At one time, Parlade also described the community pantry initiative as the work of Satan. I could think of many words to describe the community pantry effort but “Satan” is hardly the right word. What was he thinking? Does he really believe that the initiative is the handy work of leftist groups or individuals sympathetic to the CPP/NPA?
Maybe it is hard for him to believe that there are people who simply want to help the less fortunate. If that is the case, the anti-communist effort of the government could be in trouble. The fight against the CPP/NPA is difficult and complicated enough without complicating it. That’s why after more than fifty years, the CPP/NPA is still around. If it were that easy, the government would have won a long time ago.
The reason for this is that the level of discontent remains high enough to entice people to join the revolutionary struggle against the government. The discontent however, is not so high to tilt the balance against the government for the CPP/NPA to win. As one academic wrote, insurgencies are all about the perception of relationships between those who govern and those who are governed. The trick therefore, is for the government to undertake needed reforms to reduce the level of discontent to the barest minimum so that dissent can be pursued peacefully and not through revolutionary war.
One mission of the NTF-ELCAC is to bring down that level of discontent in order to win the hearts and minds of the people. This is accomplished through a series of programs designed to clear localities that are heavily influenced by the CPP/NPA. Another is to convince CPP/NPA combatants to lay down their arms and come back to the folds of the law. They are then given government assistance to be able to reintegrate back to society.
There are many other programs. The problem is, the accomplishments of the Task Force are not widely known to the public except for occasional press releases. It would help if the NTF-ELCAC can develop an effective information dissemination program so that the public will know more. This way, it will be easier for the public to support government initiatives against the CPP/NPA.
It would be a pity if the government loses ground to the CPP/NPA due to simple public relation snafus. Think about it, just when the NTF-ELCAC needs the support of Congress to pass the red tagging law and keep its huge budget, Parlade chooses to antagonize the Senate. Furthermore, this fixation on red tagging is not a good sign. It can indicate that the government is running out of other options to use in its fight against the communists. Parlade also chose to attack the community pantry initiative when a multitude of people do not have enough to eat during this pandemic.
In this time of extreme hardship, does it really matter very much who is providing the aid? If the pantry initiative is a communist effort which by all accounts is not the case, the government should simply support it to make it work better. Many are saying that the reason why this initiative took off was due to the inability of the government to provide enough aid. Instead of demonizing it, Parlade should have just issued words of encouragement. He chose however, to be the odd man out. He has remained steadfast in his style and methods which only strengthens the notion that the government is out of touch with the realities on the ground. In this aspect, the government may have lost another round in the battle for the hearts and minds of the people. Parlade should chill a little and analyze the situation thoroughly before opening his mouth. Otherwise, he will only end up damaging the government cause.