(Eagle News)—–Senator Panfilo Lacson on Thursday, Jan. 3, urged the Department of Justice to follow up in court its petition seeking to declare the Communist Party of the Philippines and the New People’s Army as terrorists.
Lacson, who was referring to the petition filed by the DOJ before the Manila Regional Trial Court in March, issued the statement after CPP founder Jose Maria Sison said the Communists “principal work” this 2019 was the ouster of President Rodrigo Duterte.
The petition was filed after Duterte ended peace talks with the Communists last year, citing what he said were their atrocities.
The senator, however, downplayed Sison’s threat, saying the CPP and NPA “are reduced to a band of extortionists, arsonists and robbers, even a terrorist group.”
“Sison and the CPP/NPA have been attempting to overthrow the government, past and present and take over government for the past 50 years, by all means possible, mostly violent through armed struggle, even through peace talks aimed at having a coalition government but still aimed at a take over, violent or otherwise,” Lacson said.
