‘Burying’ the CPLA

BEHIND THE SCENES

Alfred P. Dizon

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet -- The monster called the Cordillera People’s Liberation Army just refuses to go away – even if it is now named the Cordillera Forum for Peace and Development.

Sadanga, Mountain Province mayor Gabino Ganggangan who is the secretary general of the Cordillera Bodong Administration was saying on television the CPLA should not be referred to anymore as an organization as the former rebel group has signed a memorandum of agreement with the government for them to lay down their arms.

               

Part of the deal for joining mainstream society, he said, was for CPLA members to surrender their firearms. In return, the government would give them money or assistance for livelihood projects. The CBAd is the political arm of the CPLA. 

               

According to CBAd president Marcelina Bahatan, at least a hundred firearms have already been surrendered by the CPLA to the government. In the same TV program, Ganggangan and Bahatan said CPLA members and elders have already stripped Arsenio Humiding of his title as chief of the CPLA for so-called “infractions or violations” against the group which they didn’t mention or itemize.

               

According to other sources, last year, Humiding, with reportedly help from former presidential assistant for Cordillera affairs Thomas Killip, was able to convince the national government through the Office of the Presidential Assistant for Peace Process (OPAPP) to release millions of pesos as livelihood and development funds for the CPLA and some communities of indigenous peoples in the Cordillera which they have identified as recipients of the funds so they would cease as a rebel group and lay down their arms.

               

Some of the funds have reportedly been disbursed  “implemented.” while millions for the now CFPD have still to be released.            

If various factions of the former CPLA are now bickering, it is because each would like to get hold of millions of pesos worth of government money to fund their so-called livelihood projects.

That, according to sources who said other CPLA factions felt they were not being given enough of the moolah, livelihood or employment. 

               

Last August 6, at the Cordillera regional police headquarters in Camp Dangwa, La Trinidad Benguet, 30 so-called members of the CPLA were hired by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources as forest guards.

               

Present during the ceremony were Benguet Gov. Nestor Fongwan, DENR regional executive director Clarence Baguilat and regional police director Chief Supt. Benjamin Magalong.

               

Officials said this was part of the “social reintegration” ofthe CPLA members to government wherein they surrendered their firearms to dramatize the event. Whether money was or would be given to the former rebels, nobody was talking.

               

The 30 former CPLAs were considered lucky to be given jobs by the government. Now, people are talking, if you would like the government to listen to your grievances and earn money on the side, become a rebel like the CPLA or the Muslim Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) who are also set to be given millions, if nor billions pesos of government funds for livelihood or development.. 

               

Not all “former” CPLAs were so lucky. At the military camp in Gamu Isabela, 13 relatives of former members of the CPLA undergoing candidate soldier’s course were dropped in the middle of their training in Camp Upi.

This was confirmed by Humiding who attributed the disqualification of the candidates for their being overaged.

Humiding denied the incident was an offshoot of an internal rift within their group, referring to the attempt on the life of Felipe Cariño, the group’s vice chair.

Cariño was hurt when a bomb planted under his vehicle exploded while inside the camp on the eve of the training commencement last June 24.

He said tribal elders were also conducting a parallel investigation on the attempt on Cariño’s life, apart from  ongoing police investigation.At press time, Cariño was still in the hospital due to severe injuries.

Army Division commander Maj. Gen. Joel Ibañez allowed the CPLA to replace the dropped candidates with qualified ones to maintain the 168 number of last batch of trainees undergoing training.

               

Now Ganggangan is saying integrees to the army coming from the CPLA should be screened to weed out  dubious ones. What he meant by this, according to pundits, was that he just wanted more of his group to be included in the integration.

               

Problem, some if not most of the CPLA applicants do not have enough qualification like at least a high school diploma.

               

It is well and good that the government, through the OPAPP, is addressing insurgency also through peaceful means, even if it is also doing its share of killing and abuses, courtesy of wayward elements of the army in going against so-called “enemies of the state” like the communist New People’s Army.

               

In the case of the CPLA, if the government would like to attain social justice, it should also look into the various human rights violations committed by the group over the years and punish the guilty ones.

               

The slay of tribal leader Daniel Ngayaan in Kalinga, a certain Palaleo, then a staff of the Department of Agriculture who was burned to death in Paracelis, Mountain Province  and a lot of others who have allegedly been murdered or raped by members this group should also be looked into, so justice will be attained for victims and their families.

Otherwise, even if the CPLA itself and the government would like the wayward group to be “buried,” in the dustbin of history, it would still be a monster – feeding its bloody mouth from the taxes of starving peasants and other poor people who struggle day in day out to feed their emaciated children.