President Rodrigo Duterte. (Photo by SIMEON CELI JR / Presidential Photographers Division)
MAWAB, COMPOSTELA VALLEY—President Duterte on Monday taunted Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founding chair Jose Maria “Joma” Sison, saying if his former professor were really bright he would have become the country’s leader.
Speaking before soldiers at the headquarters of the Army’s 10th Infantry Division in Barangay Tuburan here, the President also said Sison was “desperate” because he did not have the pulse of the people anymore.
“Sison said I should see a doctor and have my head examined. Hey, Sison, if you were bright, you should have become President already,” Mr. Duterte said.
Stuck in history
At Malacañang, presidential spokesperson Harry Roque dismissed Sison’s call for the youth to emulate the riots of the “First Quarter Storm” of 1970 against the Duterte administration.
The chief ideologue of the country’s communist movement was “stuck in history,” Roque said.
“We don’t attach too much importance on Joma Sison. I hope he has enough grandchildren to heed his call,” he said, referring to the student-led uprising in the first quarter of 1970 against the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.
Sison urged the youth on Sunday to launch mass protests against Mr. Duterte.
“(The) problem with Joma Sison is he is stuck in history. He never moved beyond the First Quarter Storm,” Roque said.
No second echelons
In his speech, the President said that Sison felt alone in self-exile in Utrecht, the Netherlands, because there were “no more second echelons” in the communist movement.
“The intellectuals are gone. You old ones, you hoped that we will still talk. I’ll chew you,” Mr. Duterte said.
The President again ordered the military to “destroy” the communist insurgents and to “not believe” in human rights when they go after them.
He said the problem with the rebels was that they did not recognize human rights as well.
“I already warned you, I do not believe in human rights,” Mr. Duterte said. “You give human rights first to people who do not want violence before I’ll accord it to you. It is mutual. But if you shoot and kill people, you return what you owed.” —WITH A REPORT FROM PHILIP C. TUBEZA