Sison ready to resume talks with Duterte admin ‘anytime’

FILE: Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founding chairman Jose Maria “Joma” Sison. (Photo: Joma Sison/Facebook)

Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) Jose Maria “Joma” Sison said he is ready to resume peace negotiations with the Philippine government “anytime” President Rodrigo Duterte is ready.

“The standing policy of the NDFP (National Democratic Front of the Philippines) is to negotiate with the GRP (Government of the Republic of the Philippines) anytime he is ready to resume the peace negotiations in accordance with The Hague Joint Declaration and further agreements,” Sison wrote on his Facebook post.

CPP’s political wing is the NDFP, while its armed wing is the New People’s Army (NPA).

“It is up to him to end his position of having terminated the peace negotiations with Proclamation 360,” he added.

Sison made these remarks after Duterte, in a speech during the inauguration of the Gaisano Grand Citygate Mall in Davao City on Friday, urged anew members of the NPA to surrender their arms, offering them a comfortable life.

“Listen, NPAs. I’m not fighting with you and I don’t want to kill you, but I don’t know about you. But we are really friends,” the President, who previously had heated exchanges with the communist rebels’ leader, said in Bisaya.

“Your underground movement will not amount to anything. But I am ready to accept you if you surrender. Bring your firearms, give it to me, and I will give you a house and a job. You can be sure of that,” he continued.

In response to this, Sison said his former student was either trying to “sound less hostile” or is “still hostile” for trying to bribe them to surrender to the government.

“He is correct though in saying that the NPA will continue to exist even after he and I are gone from the surface of the earth, if by implication he means positively that the root causes of the armed conflict must be addressed and solved by social, economic and political reforms,” the CPP leader noted.

The relationship between the CPP and the current administration started to turn sour after the President signed Proclamation No. 360, which formally terminates negotiations with the CPP-NPA-NDFP, in November 2017.