Duterte unsure if peace talks will resume as he hurled new tirades vs communists
MANILA, Philippines — President Rodrigo Duterte admitted Wednesday that he was not sure whether the stalled peace talks with the communists would resume as he hurled fresh tirades at the rebels who were recently tagged in an alleged ouster plot against him.
Duterte said the New People's Army, the armed wing of the communists, have been plotting to destroy the government and killing soldiers and policemen for decades.
"I don’t know if it (talks) could be revived. But I am not ready at this time to talk about talking to the communist. For as long as there is an objection from the military and the police...," the president said during an event of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology in Calamba, Laguna.
Duterte insisted that he is now allowed to share powers with the communists.
"It would now appear that more or less there is a sharing...of governmental powers which we cannot concede, I cannot give because we do not own sovereignty," he said.
The military had claimed that communists have crafted a plan to destabilize the Duterte administration next month but leftist groups dismissed it as "the height of paranoia."
Duterte said he had tried to extend a helping hand to the communists, even appointing personalities associated with the political left to the Cabinet.
"Good thing, Congress rejected their appointments," he added.
The left-leaning personalities who were appointed to the Cabinet but were subsequently rejected by the Commission on Appointments were former Agrarian Reform Secretary Rafael Mariano and former Social Welfare Secretary Judy Taguiwalo.
Peace talks between the government and the communists were canceled after Duterte alleged that the rebels are pushing for a coalition government, a power-sharing deal that he claimed is unconstitutional.
Last week, Duterte predicted that the decades-old communist insurgency would be defeated by the second quarter of 2019.
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