Campus protests a portent of bigger mass unrest, claims CPP

Bigger mass actions lie ahead following violent student protests in recent weeks in connection with tuition increases, the Communist Party of the Philippines claimed. In a statement on its Website, the CPP lauded the militant students behind the protests, saying they should inspire people to step up mass struggles. "The CPP and the entire revolutionary movement salute the students of [the Polytechnic University of the Philippines] and University of the Philippines for their militant struggles and congratulate them for the tactical victories they have won," the communist party said. "At the same time, the CPP enjoins the students to further build up their organizations and mobilize in greater numbers to sustain a long-drawn struggle for their democratic rights and the people’s right to education and to advance the student protest movement to a new and higher level," it added. But Lt. Col Arnulfo Burgos, Armed Forces of the Philippines public information chief, said the communist party was just riding on the issue, adding that militant students should be wary of being unwittingly used by the communist movement. "We believe in diplomacy and peaceful means to achieve any objectives," he told dzBB radio on Sunday. It said students should also link up and join ranks with workers, urban poor, peasants, national minorities and other oppressed sectors "in advancing the struggle of the working classes and the mass of the Filipino people in the face of widespread unemployment, rising costs of living, worsening poverty and hunger, rampant plunder and gross corruption, deteriorating social services and intensifying repression." Earlier this week, students of the Polytechnic University of the Philippines protested a looming tuition hike. Five students were arrested and charged for trying to burn classroom chairs during the protests. But the CPP said the PUP students succeeded in drawing national attention to their problems and gained a tactical victory after the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) stopped the tuition hike. The CHED also ordered a similar tuition freeze in all other state colleges and universities, it added. The CPP said students were also up in arms against commercialization schemes in other state schools. It said students of the University of the Philippines system had opposed the suspension of the student council in Los Baños, the removal of the student representative in the UP Board of Regents and Malacañang’s alleged interference to ensure the installation of a pro-privatization director at the UP’s Philippine General Hospital. "With their protest actions, the UP students, as well as teachers and other personnel, have succeeded in further building opposition to the US-Arroyo regime’s creeping privatization agenda for state schools and hospitals," the CPP said. "Through the past several years, instead of appropriately increasing government support for state schools, the ruling regime has been pushing UP and other state schools to plug its deficits through numerous privatization schemes. Government budgets for education and other social needs are sacrificed in favor of debt servicing and the military," it added. The CPP said students from other universities should learn and be inspired by the struggle and victories won by the students of PUP and UP. “The acute socio-economic crisis is driving the working people and their children to protest the rising costs of education as well as other social services in the face of their worsening poverty. Planned tuition fee increases in the coming school year are sure to be met with more massive and intense student protest actions nationwide," it said. — GMANews.TV