One of the things I admire about the late President Ramon Magsaysay is that he may be one of the few leaders of the Philippines to solve the root problem of the country's Communist insurgency.
Before he became president in 1953, Magsaysay first served as Secretary of National Defense under President Elpidio Quirino. One of his tasks then was solving the problem of the rise of the Hukbalahap, a former anti-Japanese guerilla group that has transformed into an armed Communist rebel group after World War II.
Magsaysay seemed to have realized that the best (and probably only) way to eradicate the Communist insurgency is to resolve the main issues of why many peasants have decided to join the Communists: poverty and inequality.
When he became President, Magsaysay championed the cause of land reform and, through the National Resettlement and Rehabilitation Administration (NARRA), sought to resettle many former land tenants into other places in the Philippines.
One such place where Magsaysay resolved the issue of land tenancy is in San Pedro City, Laguna, where the vast tract of land formerly known as Hacienda Tunasan were ultimately handed over to local tenants in 1954. (By the way, this is the main reason why two barangays in San Pedro City are named Magsaysay and Narra.)
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Why am I relating this story?
You see, I am bothered by the fact that many of those seeking to eradicate the problem of Communist insurgency never seemed to mention the socio-economic ills that enabled the Communists to rise to power, especially in rural areas.
More often, the official line of anti-Communists here in the Philippines consists of an endless stream of black propaganda portraying them as terrorists, thugs, murderers, hinderers of progress and poisoners of the minds of the youth.
But they never mention the fact that what enabled Communists to thrive in the first place is the problem of socio-economic oppression.
We’re talking here about oligarchs seizing vast tracts of land through legal chicanery and violence; the destruction of vital land resources; the sad neglect of agriculture due to our “imports-centered” policies; the domino effect of the rise of basic goods and services; and brutalities that are sometimes committed by the very people who have been sworn to protect the State and the people.
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To use an analogy that “plantitos” and “plantitas” will understand: if you want to get rid of weeds in your garden, you have to pull it out by the roots. If you just use shears to trim them off without really pulling them out, chances are the weeds will grow back again.
I’d like to be clear here: I’m not a fan of the Communist creed either. But the main issue here is that if we are ever to solve the problem of Communist insurgency, we had to address the root causes of the problem that enabled them in the first place.