Philippines-On the immediate tasks of communists and their struggle for socialism (Part 2)

From Communist Party of the Philippines (Central Committee)/ http://www.groups.yahoo.com/group/MAOIST_REVOLUTION

June 02, 2012

Focus topics: Broaden the Revolutionary United Front! (part 2)

The legal mass organizations and alliances make it a point to assert their independence from the Communist Party of the Philippines and the illegal revolutionary mass organizations. They do so obviously to counter the anti-communist witch hunts, that have become more vicious than ever under the so-called antiterrorism law. They are closely related to progressive party list groups that participate in electoral struggles within the ruling system.
Of course, the Communist Party of the Philippines has developed various types of illegal mass organizations. The most important of these in terms of waging the protracted people's war is the New People's Army. It is led by the Party and the working class and most of the Red commanders and fighters come from the peasantry. At the moment, the NPA is engaged in the five-year strategic plan to advance the people's war from the strategic defensive to the strategic stalemate.
There is a comprehensive array of underground mass organizations for workers, peasants, youth, women, cultural workers, lawyers, scientists and technologies. And there are underground alliances of the peoples of Cordillera, Moros and the Lumads and the progressive religious, especially the Christians for National Liberation. All the aforesaid underground revolutionary forces are dedicated to the people's war. Together with the CPP and NPA, they belong to the National Democratic Front of the Philippines.
The NDFP is a revolutionary united front organization, with its own program of people's democratic revolution and constitution harmonious with those of the CPP. The NDFP consists of the mass formations of the toiling masses and the urban petty bourgeoisie. But it is ever ready to broaden the united front so as to include the middle bourgeoisie and even the temporary and unreliable allies from among the ranks of the reactionaries who oppose the worst of the reactionaries as the enemy.
The NDFP has gone so far as to engage in peace negotiations with a series of reactionary regimes in order to assert its status of belligerency under international law and to demand that the roots of the armed conflict be addressed to lay the basis for a just and lasting peace. To avert confusion among the revolutionaries and people, the CPP and NDFP have always made it clear that the line for a just and lasting peace is no different from the line of the new democratic revolution. The reactionary regimes have failed to come to an agreement on a just and lasting peace because of their extreme subservience to US imperialism and the local exploiting classes of big compradors and landlords.
The patriotic and progressive mass organizations and alliances have been responsible for well-sustained campaigns on highly significant issues and for large scale mobilizations that have resulted in the overthrow of the Marcos fascist dictatorship and the corrupt Estrada regime. They generate the campaigns and activities that carry the general line of new democratic revolution and express the protests and demands of the people. In turn, they are strengthened by these acts of mass mobilization which bring forward mass activists on a large scale.
The strategic line of protracted people's war in the Philippines is now greatly favored by the terrible conditions of oppression and exploitation generated by the crisis of the world capitalist system. All forms of people's resistance, including general strikes and mass protest rallies and armed revolutionary movements, are spreading and growing in strength.
The Philippine revolutionary movement is contributing what it can in order to expand and intensify the revolutionary movements of the people of the world against imperialism and for national liberation, democracy and socialism. At the same time, it is benefited by the expansion and intensification of revolutionary movements abroad.
The imperialist powers can be dizzied and weakened by the great number of what they consider as trouble spots. In all continents and in so many countries, including the imperialist countries, the grave all-round crisis has resulted in an upsurge of mass movements. The entire world is in ferment. We are on the eve of great social upheavals and revolutionary advances.
Thanks to the use of higher technology, the monopoly bourgeoisie has accelerated not only the accumulation of capital and profit-making but also the recurrence and worsening of the crisis of overproduction and the abuse of monopoly finance capital. It has produced the rapid means of communications that the revolutionary forces can also avail of.
Revolutionary propaganda and agitation, the organization of people in various types of mass formations and mass mobilizations have been facilitated and accelerated by use of the internet, cellphone, audio-visuals and social networks. But of f course, we presume that the revolutionary forces use these means very intelligently and effectively, mindful that the the enemy uses the same means against the revolutionary movement.
Immediate Organizational Tasks
The Communist Party of the Philippines is guided by democratic centralism as its basic organizational principle. This means centralized leadership based on democracy and democracy guided by centralized leadership. It is an effective way of giving full play to democratic debates and taking decisions at every level and from the lowest level to the highest and concentrating promptly the will of the entire Party in the Central Committee.
At the base of the Party are the Party branches and groups or fractions within mass organizations and institutions. On the basis of facts and discussions, they give reports and recommendations to the section committee. Section committees make reports and recommendations to the district committee; the district committees to the provincial committee; the provincial committees to the regional committee; and the regional committees to the Central Committee. Decisions of the Central Committee go down from level to level.
The individual Party members are subordinate to the entire Party and the Central Committee. At any level, decisions are taken by majority vote or consensus after full discussion of an issue. The lower organ is subordinate to the higher organ. The essence of centralized leadership is upholding Marxism-Leninism as guide to action and applying it on concrete issues and circumstances. In the first place, the Party is constituted as a Marxist-Leninist party and its members are educated, trained and act as Marxist-Leninists.
The Party recruits its members from the ranks of the advanced mass activists. These are considered advanced because they have a relatively high level of political consciousness, are militant and conscientiously perform their tasks. Most important of all, they are willing to join the Party. They enter the Party first as candidate members. The period of candidature for workers and peasants is six months and for the urban petty bourgeoisie, one year.
The mass movement is growing fast because of the severity and protraction of the economic, social and political crisis and because the Party and the mass organizations are intensifying propaganda and agitation, mass organizing of various types and mass mobilizations on the burning issues. On the basis of the fast growing mass movement, the Party can recruit fast and carry out the policy of expanding the Party boldly without letting in a single undesirable element. The honesty of every applicant for Party membership is of crucial importance and is verified.
The rapid expansion of the Party is required by the worsening crisis and by the need of the Party to strengthen itself for its current strategic plan of advancing from the strategic defensive to the strategic stalemate in the people's war. The Party is resolved to make an accelerated advance on the basis of more than 43 years of building the Party, the mass organizations in both urban and rural areas and the organs of political power in the countryside.
The cadres of the Party are in leading organs of the Party itself as well as in those of the New People's Army, the mass organizations and the people's government. They have developed into cadres by virtue of their ability to lead ideological, political and organizational work and to accomplish the expansion and consolidation of the Party organizations to which they are assigned. The rapid expansion of the Party that is now being carried out is expected to result in the rapid development of cadres.
All Party cadres and members are acutely conscious of the need to fulfil the central task of the revolution, which is to seize political power, and of the decisive role of the Party in leading the revolutionary process. The Party serves as the coordinator of the forces of the New People's Army and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines and the various forms of struggle in both the urban and rural areas.
Party cadres and members in the urban areas are conscious of developing the legal mass movement in order to support and complement the revolutionary armed struggle in the countryside and they encourage the workers and educated youth to join the people's army. Those in the rural areas, especially in the people's army, are conscious of advancing the people's war in order to bring about ultimately the nationwide seizure of political power .
The broad masses of the Filipino people and the revolutionary led by the Communist Party of the Philippines are confident of completing the stage of the new democratic revolution and proceeding to the stage of socialist revolution. Their confidence is based on adherence to the theory and practice of Marxism-Leninism, awareness of the chronic crisis and losing course of the domestic ruling system and the world capitalist system, learning lessons from the experiences of the revolutionary movement in the Philippines and abroad and undertaking all the necessary hard work and struggle to advance the revolution from one stage to another.