Just a week after announcing a unilateral ceasefire with the Left, President Rodrigo Duterte ordered to lift the truce after the other party failed to declare their own ceasefire on Saturday, July 30.
Duterte announced that he is lifting the ceasefire two hours after the set deadline for the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) to declare armistice on their part.
“Let me now announce that I am hereby ordering for the immediate lifting of the unilateral ceasefire that I ordered last July 25 against the communist rebels,” the president said on Saturday evening.
Duterte’s ultimatum for the CPP comes after the attack of the New People’s Army (NPA) against Citizen Armed Force Geographical Unit (CAFGU) in Davao del Norte on Wednesday. NPA is the armed wing of the left movement.
Going by his announcement, Duterte ordered all the government’s security forces to be “on high alert and continue to discharge their normal functions and mandate to neutralize all threats to national security, protect the citizenry, enforce the laws and maintain peace in the land.”
“I am ordering the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National Police to also withdraw the operational guidelines they issued in pursuance to that ceasefire declaration,” he said.
CPP’s political arm National Democratic Front (NDF) earlier sought for time from the government for them to declare ceasefire as they have yet to investigate the conflict that occurred in Davao del Norte.
Meanwhile, CPP founder Joma Sison also said previously that the left movement will have to study the repercussions of issuing the ceasefire since it took three days for the government to specify the content of its unilateral ceasefire.
The Duterte administration’s ceasefire was part of the peace talks of the government with the leftists for a “just and lasting peace.” The negotiations should have been resumed in August after their first discussion back in June.
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