AFP dirty tricks plan vs. partylists exposed; Bayan Muna discloses CD of military tactical

In a media briefing at the party headquarters in Quezon City, Bayan Muna bared the existence of a 51-slide Powerpoint presentation entitled “CPP-NPA-NDF Partylist Operations for 2004 Elections.”

The AFP document aimed to "make it hard for CPP-NPA-NDF partylist groups to campaign and make it easy for partylist allies to campaign".

To achieve these aims, the document pushed “focus denial operations” in 305 cities and towns tagged as CPP-NPA-NDF strongholds, the division of potential votes by promoting AFP-preferred partyllsts, and the actual use of AFP and PNP operations.

Among the listed tasks for local military units are the securing of arrest warrants for "cadres attached to local candidates", tactical operations to prevent local bets and partylists from campaigning, and the filing of disqualification cases.

Identified as allied partylists were ABA-AKO, COOP-NATCO, Akapin, Abanse Pinay, Akbayan, TUCP and "others".

The AFP document also prescribes nationwide briefings in major services, area commands, PNP regional and provincial offices, the levels of division, brigade and battalion, Triad Group, CRS and PCRG and intel groups.

"A military officer from the Visayas furnished us copies of this damning piece of evidence on February 26, 2007 after the start of the partylist campaign and in the aftermath of UN Special Rapporteur Philip Alston's statement tagging the AFP as the perpetrator of most of the over 800 incidents of extrajudicial killings," revealed Neri Javier Colmenares, Bayan Muna general counsel and third nominee for partylist representative.

According to Colmenares, “the tagging of Bayan Muna as a CPP-NPA-NDF front is a tired, old ploy of the AFP and PNP. They can say so until they are hoarse, but it is a different thing when they use soldiers and policemen to actively meddle in the partylist elections. That is electioneering and expanding the counter-insurgency war into the realm of civilians and non-combatants.”

House Deputy Minority Leader and Bayan Muna President Satur Ocampo also disclosed another AFP document outlining an SOT project for partylist operations in 2007, titled “AFP Onward to Political Warfare Arena” authored by Lt. Col. Yogyog-NIWG1. Ocampo urged the Commission on Elections to summon the AFP officialdom regarding the anti-partylist plan and issue a categorical order directing the military and police to keep their hands off the partylist elections.

Said Bayan Muna Representative Teddy Casiño: “This document is a product of dirty minds who have no qualms subverting the partylist system, the Constitution and the rule of law. They go by the names Hermogenes Esperon and Jovito Palparan, Romeo Tolentino, among others.”

“This was the bible of the dirty tricks operators who tried in vain to defeat us in 2004. There are clear indications, such as the fabricated disqualification charge and the continued harassment of progressive partylist chapters in communities, that the plan has been re-operationalized in 2007,” said Casiño . ###