The NDFP-Mindanao expresses its deepest sympathies to the victims of typhoon Pedring, in which, at latest count, the death toll has reached 35, with 34 injured and more than 40 still missing. Hundreds continue to be stranded in many parts of the country, while thousands have been hindered from working. According to reports, it has left over a million peso worth of damage in the agriculture sector and more than a billion pesos worth over all, making it one of the most destructive storms ever to hit the Philippines in recent history.

The aftermath of typhoon Pedring will once again bring untold suffering to Filipinos who are already reeling from the impact of an anti-people economy, especially from recent increases in petroleum and other basic commodities. This will adversely hit poor peasants who remain deprived of land under the exploitative and oppressive terms of semi-feudalism.

After Benigno Aquino III’s trip to Japan, his government only has had some palliatives to offer in the face of Pedring’s wrath. It has done barely enough by trying to appease the Filipino people’s agony with more Official Development Assistance (ODA) packages from Japan, which only means more intensified exploitation of the people by foreign monopolists. This time, cash “dole-outs,” such as the 4P’s, and other such gimmick are inutile in alleviating the anguish of the people.

Barely recovering from Pedring’s trail of death and destruction, the Filipino people will once again be confronted this week with a new storm – typhoon Quiel, which is expected to cause more damage to lives and property than its predecessor. Will the Aquino government again dangle more “foreign investments” and “cash incentive gimmicks” instead of taking serious steps in helping avoid losing precious human lives and avoid great damage caused by impending super storms?

Since last year, the NDFP in Mindanao has been urging the Aquino government to take banning large mining, logging and agri-business concessions in the country seriously, and do so without delay. It has been reiterated that these companies, such as the ones in operation in the province of Caraga and in other parts of Mindanao, rapidly deplete the country’s natural resources and heavily damage the environment, which often result in massive soil erosion and flooding especially when the storms come.

The Aquino government’s call to “protect the environment” is nothing more than sheer rhetoric; it has unabashedly continued to be both deaf and dumb, and blind, to the call of the people and of the revolutionary movement to put a stop to the operation of these environmentally-exploitative and destructive businesses.

Like its collusion with the oil cartel, the Aquino regime’s blatant disregard and inaction to the people’s call for a decisive defense of the environment also places it in connivance with big mining, logging and agri-business monopolies to wantonly exploit natural resources, destroy the environment, and, worse, displace thousands upon thousands of peasants and Lumads, and exploit the workers.

For its part, the Communist Party of the Philippines – Mindanao Commission, the National Democratic Front of the Philippines in Mindanao, the New People’s Army, and the whole revolutionary movement shall continue to uphold and to carry our national policy of banning and dismantling large-scale mining, logging and agri-business companies with a track record of violating revolutionary policies related to the defense of the basic rights of peasants, Lumads, and workers, and to the protection and preservation of the environment and natural resources.#