(We yield this space to the statement of the Philippine Ecumenical Peace Platform due to its timeliness. – Ed.)
THIRTY-nine years ago, in 1981, the United Nations issued the “declaration on the right to peace” which affirmed peace as a sacred right of all people and a fundamental obligation of each state. This year’s International Day of Peace (Sept. 21) theme “Shaping Peace Together” takes on a whole new resonance as the world reels from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The call for national unity to shape peace together becomes more urgent in the light of the ongoing health and economic crises that the country is facing.
Unfortunately, it appears that the Philippine government is failing in its obligation to affirm peace as our sacred right. Rampant human rights violations have been documented by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the passage of the controversial Anti-Terrorism Act, whose constitutionality is being challenged by at least 35 separate petitions before the Supreme Court. It has encouraged historical revisionism favoring the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos whose declaration of Martial Law also fell on Sept. 21. It has also thrown away the results of the back-channel talks with the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) a few months ago.
Sadly too, the government seems determined to crush the NDFP and its allied organizations, the Communist Party of the Philippines and the New People’s Army, instead of really putting all its resources in combatting the myriad problems brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic. It has also allocated billions of pesos for intelligence funds and for the National Task Force on Ending Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), which the Commission of Audit admitted, is helpless in auditing. The NTF-ELCAC has become notorious for its rampant red-tagging and is responsible for vilifying even church organizations, church leaders and members.
It is in this spirit that we reiterate our call on the government to focus its efforts and funds for medical and socio-economic solutions to heal the nation and reconsider its focus and spending for counter-insurgency and all-out war. The Philippine Ecumenical Peace Platform has always maintained that principled peace negotiations require much, much less funds and is less costly to life and limb, which if followed to the letter means more funds for our people mired now in hunger and poverty.
The United Nations are also calling on warring parties on this day to observe at least an all-day ceasefire and we call on the government and the NDFP to join the whole world in this historic occasion. Let us join in prayer and let us shape our peace together so that all our people will share justly in God’s bounty.
Scripture reminds us that “peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness” (James 3:18).
