Bulatlatan
Written by: the Communist Party of the Philippines
Published: Bulatlatan, February 28, 2010;
Source: Bulatlatan snapshot at the Internet Archive;
Markup: Simoun Magsalin.
We are posting the Ang Bayan Editorial February 21, 2010, with no editorial comments from the Bulatlatan editors.
We are encouraging more contributors to send their articles to enliven democratic debates on the 2010 national elections. Sadly, within the proletarian party and the whole national democratic movement, there is more centralism than democracy in the healthy exchange of ideas among comrades, friends and allies.
We have long given up such democratic debates can ever see the light of day in the web pages of the Philippine Revolution Web Central, Bulatlat or other websites.
Elections under the rotten ruling reactionary state and system are bogus and always fraught with anomalies and violence. They are concentrated competitions where rival elitist factions try to outdo each other in terms of strength, money and schemes to gain the upper hand in exercising puppet reactionary rule. Violence, bribery and fraud are the key elements behind victory.
They are not genuine democratic processes and do not reflect the people’s real interests. They are virtual circuses for the people’s entertainment. They exploit the people’s poverty and beguile them with money and other material things in order to win their votes. The exercise of suffrage is used as an adornment to make the process appear democratic. For as long as the people are made to pin their hopes on reactionary elections, the vast majority will continue participating in these exercises.
Nonetheless, to the limited extent possible under the reactionary state and system, it is important to take advantage of reactionary elections in order to acquire concrete gains in the interest of the people and the revolutionary movement. It is the duty of the revolutionary forces to closely guide the people as they participate in reactionary elections.
The revolutionary movement applies dual tactics during reactionary elections. It is a basic task of the revolutionary movement to expose the inutility of reactionary elections and the rottenness of the system within which they exist. The revolutionary forces give stress to armed struggle as the guaranteed and primary means of seizing political power to achieve fundamental and thoroughgoing social change.
Simultaneously, the revolutionary movement also seizes the opportunities presented by elections in order to expand alliance work on various levels. It unites with candidates and parties that are ready to advance the democratic and patriotic interests and welfare of the people. As allies and progressives win seats, the people’s struggles are also advanced inside parliament. Such opportunities are utilized by mass movements and organizations and enable them to use the resources of the reactionary state to directly benefit the people. On the other hand, contradictions among reactionaries are taken advantage of to further isolate and target the main and most rabid enemies of the people and the revolution.
Whether the alliances formed during elections are strategic or temporary, it is important even beyond the elections to continue providing political education and to organize and mobilize those who forged unities with us. Thus, the relationships that have been formed are enhanced and allies may be counted on to continue cooperating with the revolutionary movement and the people.
During reactionary elections, the revolutionary forces strive to protect the vast revolutionary areas that gain prominence and are visited by politicians. The revolutionary forces require politicians to respect and obey the laws and policies of the people’s revolutionary government. Campaigning within the revolutionary areas is allowed subject to strict conditions and controls especially with regards to the entry and movements of armed personnel. Fascists and rabid reactionaries are not allowed to spread their propaganda, conduct surveillance and foment disturbances in these areas.
The participation of progressive candidates and parties is a striking feature of the current elections. They conduct widespread campaigns to arouse, organize and mobilize the masses as a means of reaching out to millions upon millions of other people. Through this, they are able to expand their influence and organization and raise the people’s capability to resist the ruling reactionary regime and the entire rotten ruling system.
This is the reason why the people are so ardent in mobilizing to support them despite the many obstacles thrown their way. In recent years, these progressive parties and candidates were able to effectively use parliament in tandem with the democratic mass movement to advance the people’s national-democratic aspirations and interests despite their being a tiny minority. It therefore comes as no surprise that rabid reactionaries have been trying tooth and nail to obstruct the efforts of progressive parties. Progressive leaders, activists and their supporters are the main targets of fascist attacks. They are also targets of systematic electoral fraud.
Poll fraud may even take on a more virulent, if sophisticated form in the face of the automated elections in May.
Thus, the people and their progressive forces must move in a more intelligent, planned, coordinated and systematic manner to address, expose and strive to frustrate both electoral fraud and fascist attacks on their ranks.
The current elections are also taking place amid the US-Arroyo regime’s obstinate desire to cling to power and avoid accountability for its many grave crimes against the people. Its desperation becomes even more apparent in the face of the people’s ever worsening poverty, oppression and discontent as they are bludgeoned by a most severe economic crisis and intensifying fascist attacks. The situation spurs the people even more to demand relief from their oppression and poverty and cry for significant changes in the country. It opens up opportunities for the forging of alliances with parties and candidates who are against the Arroyo clique and puppet rule and who are ready to cooperate in advancing the people’s basic interests and alleviate their heavy burdens.
Parties and candidates even from the opposition who have committed serious crimes against the people must be exposed and lambasted. Those who blatantly advocate policies that trample on the people’s rights and interests must be exposed, so with parties whose programs are worthless and do nothing but hoodwink the people. Parties that will further impoverish the people and attack their revolutionary movement once they gain power must be condemned.
Tactical offensives must be intensified during reactionary elections, with particular emphasis given to targeting fascist and terrorist leaders. During elections, it is important to stress even more the launching of tactical offensives against the most rabidly reactionary politicians and their armed minions, and against the biggest and most despicable plunderers, the most corrupt bureaucrats and those who owe blood debts to the people and the revolution.
Simultaneously, everyone must be ready for a whole range of possibilities, from massive electoral fraud and sabotage and the deliberate failure of elections to the imposition of emergency rule, transition rule or outright martial law as well as other dirty and violent schemes being hatched by the ruling regime. The Party and the revolutionary forces must swiftly and effectively take the lead should the looming possibility of direct and widespread people’s actions materialize and should these culminate in uprisings and assertions of the people’s power.
Whether the elections take place or not, and whatever the configuration will be after Mayo 2010, the masses will continue to be plagued with discontent and the reactionaries besieged by bitter rivalries. We must be ever vigilant with every twist and turn in the situation, become even more flexible and exercise even more initiative in order to seize opportunities for the people and the revolutionary forces to prevail and gain strength.###
http://theprwcblogs.blogspot.com/2010/02/revolutionary-tasks-during-elections.html