The National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) never misses opportunities to inject its outrageous and dangerous narratives into the national discourse, no matter how misplaced it is.
As expected, the NTF-ELCAC seized upon the school shootings in Tacloban City and Zamboanga City, but the first thing it did in its latest statement was to take great pains to say that the incidents were still under investigation and that no conclusions should be drawn as yet. It was a very obvious effort to downplay the fact that these two incidents involved a child and a nephew of law enforcement officers, with the shooters able to take hold of weapons legally issued to their duty-bearer relatives.
Then, in an astounding leap of logic, the NTF-ELCAC rambled about the youth being vulnerable to various pressures and influences that predisposed them to violence, and interjected its case that among the forces that exploit vulnerable youth are the communists and their so-called front organizations.
But no matter how hard the NTF-ELCAC forces its distorted narratives, it will always have to confront the fact that none of the red-tagged youth organizations was involved in the Tacloban and Zamboanga school shootings.
The NTF-ELCAC should also own up to the fact that it has had a role in inuring even grade school children to scenes of violence when, during its red-tagging sprees, it shows them photographs of NPA members killed in encounters, with all the blood and gore. These disgusting practices have the avowed objective of infusing fear among children and youth, instead of helping them understand the social context of armed conflict. They are also instruments of fascization, making impressionable children and youth come to the conclusion that violent acts of State forces are normal and justified against targeted individuals and organizations, which is the very goal of red-tagging.
The NTF-ELCAC took the occasion to push a number of bills ostensibly meant to protect the youth. Being brainchildren of the NTF-ELCAC, these bills must be rejected, lest they be enacted into law and added to the State’s arsenal of weapons that will further curtail academic freedom, critical thought and the education sector’s rights to free expression, to organize and to mobilize to air their grievances.