MANILA, Philippines — Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana on Sunday maintained that the communist rebels could never be sincere in engaging in peace talks as they have been amassing some P1 billion annually from extortion.
Lorenzana told reporters in a message that the information was gathered by the intelligence community and that he saw a report in 2017 stating that the Communist Party of the Philippines’ armed wing New People’s Army (NPA) amassed P1 billion that year from harassment and extortion.
He pointed out that there was a concentration of NPA members in western Mindanao because of the large projects and companies there.
“Most of the mining, huge banana plantations are in western Mindanao. Add the telecommunications companies and the government projects being done by private contractors and the amount extorted is huge. That is the main source of their financing,” Lorenzana said. INQ