A WORLD TO WIN    #23   (1998)

Rectification Movement in the Communist Party of the Philippines
Putting Mao at the Heart of Party Life

 The documents reprinted below are from Rebolusyon, the theoretical journal of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). They concern an important rectification movement that the CPP has been waging over the past few years.

 The CPP has been part of the worldwide Maoist movement since it was founded in 1969 in the great wave of revolutionary movements inspired by the Cultural Revolution. It was in fact formed directly out of a fierce battle by young revolutionaries against the pro-Soviet revisionist line and leadership that then headed up the CPP. Indeed, the Party calls this the First Great Rectification Movement.

 The CPP̓s founding documents strongly affirmed Mao Tsetung̓s basic developments of Marxism-Leninism. Amidst a powerful surge of mass rebellions then shaking the Philippines, the CPP launched a People̓s War against the US-backed Marcos regime.

 The People's War continued to advance over the next few years, but soon the Party faced a series of rapid, dramatic changes in the international and national situation, including the reactionary 1976 coup in China and the capture of the Party̓s founding chairman José Maria Sison and other top leaders. In this difficult situation, the Party began to lose its bearings. For many years no stand was taken against the Deng Xiao-ping regime, and a series of other errors arose, including on military strategy, the united front, and, before long, on such questions as the class nature of the Soviet Union and whether it could be a source of aid to the revolutionary movement. (For ore on this, including the CoRIM̓s Open Letter calling on the CPP comrades to turn back to Mao, see AWTW 1987/8 and AWTW 1988/12.)

 By the mid to late 1980s, the situation had grown serious indeed. The Party had been buffeted sharply by an inability to deal correctly with the fall of the Marcos dictatorship and the rise of Cory Aquino, and grave errors had been committed in the handling of inner-party struggle and the struggle against enemy infiltrators in one particular region (referred to in the documents below as the Ajos campaign). Trends even arose to drop Mao Tsetung Thought completely. As the CPP Central Committee itself has now summed up, the very life of the Party was coming under threat.

 Not long afterwards, those forces in the Party who had been pushing to support the Soviet Union were dealt a sharp blow by the weakening and then collapse of the revisionist facade there. However, it was not until 1992 that the revolutionary forces were able to bring together the strength and understanding necessary to launch an actual rectification campaign within the Party, led by the Central Committee and its Chairman Liwanag.

 The rectification campaign has been leading the cadres in digging out the revisionist influences, and the revolutionary enthusiasm of the comrades has been unleashed. The process is going deeper and further than had been foreseen. The campaign has been waged for five years now and, of course, has been uneven. It has taken many unforeseeable twists and turns, as accounts (reprinted in Rebolusyon) by the Party leadership in the regions as well as centrally make clear. In the midst of this process the Party has maintained its national presence and preserved the People̓s War. This is powerful testimony to the deep roots of Maoism in the ranks of the Party and its supporters.

 Revisionist forces within and around the Party taunted the revolutionary comrades for “dogmatically” sticking to the “slow” track of protracted people̓s war. They promised “quicker, easier” paths to victory, incorporating elements of urban insurrectionism or decisive large-scale military confrontations with visions of international aid. These left-sounding promises hid a thoroughly reformist essence, for, as one critique put it, “they are easier and quicker because they bypass any real revolution”. ⁽For more on the line of urban insurrectionism see, Protracted People̓s War is the Road to Liberation — A critique of Omar Tupaz's “Toward a Revolutionary Strategy of the 90s”, Centre for Social Studies, Netherlands. Available from AWTW.) The right essence of the “left” opportunist line has stood out sharply as the rectification campaign has developed.

 Many questions have been battled out, including on the class character of the Philippines, the basic strategy of people̓s war, the nature of the United Front and many others. But the most important advance achieved by the rectification movement has been bringing the teachings of Mao Tsetung back to the heart of the Party̓s life. The Maoist teachings on the strategy of people̓s war and new democratic revolution in particular have been the subject of serious study campaigns carried out in close relationship to summing up practice and carrying out criticism/self-criticism at every level of the Party. The goal of classless society, communism, has been reaffirmed, and revisionism roundly attacked, including the Deng regime in China. AWTW is reprinting these documents with the permission of the CPP to make this important campaign better known to revolutionaries worldwide.

 Every revolutionary communist should support this rectification movement in arming the comrades of the CPP with an ever deeper understanding of MLM, so that they are able to further revitalize and propel forward the People̓s War to defeat the US-backed comprador regime and turn the Philippines into a powerful red base area for the world proletarian revolution. The excerpt from the first document, Reaffirm Our Basic Principles and Rectify Errors, is from section one “In the Field of Ideology”. The other two sections are entitled "In the Field of Politics" and “In the Field of Organization”. Similarily, the excerpt from the document by the CC Executive Committee is from section one “Ideological Rectification and Strengthening”. The other two sections are entitled, “Advancing the People̓s Democratic Revolution” and “Consolidating the Organization”.

Note: The spelling of proper nouns is as in the original document — AWTW

Reaffirm Our Basic Principles and Rectify Errors

Central Committee, Communist Party of the Philippines, July 1992

 [Rebolusyon Editorial Note: This is the final document as amended and approved by the Central Committee of the Party.

 ....Because this is a summing up of major errors and shortcomings and also a rectification document, there is preponderance of criticism rather than of celebration of the achievements of the Party.

 This is the principal document of the on-going rectification movement. It is supplemented by the General Review of Important Events and Decisions (1980 to 1991).]

 Let us reaffirm the basic revolutionary principles of the Party on the 23rd anniversary of its re-establishment. These are our guiding light in taking stock of and celebrating the accomplishments of the Party as well as in confronting certain long-running problems and unprecedented setbacks.

 Our basic principles are set forth in the documents of re-establishment such as “Rectify Errors and Rebuild the Party”, the Party Constitution and Program. As proletarian revolutionaries, we must always measure ourselves according to these principles.

 These principles run through the following: adherence to the theory of Marxism-Leninism, repudiation of modern revisionism, the class analysis of Philippine society as semi-colonial and semi-feudal, the general line of new democratic revolution, the leading role of the working class through the Party, the theory of people̓s war and the strategic line of encircling the cities from the countryside, the united front along the revolutionary class line, democratic centralism, the socialist perspective and proletarian internationalism.

 Through the years, the overwhelming majority of Party cadres and members have adhered to these basic principles and have won great victories in carrying the Philippine revolution forward. The Party played an outstanding role in the long struggle against the U.S.-Marcos fascist dictatorship up to the end and comprehensively and profoundly advanced the Philippine revolution to a level higher than at any time in the past.

 Under the guidance of the Party̓s general line, correct tactics against the U.S.-Marcos fascist dictatorship, policy on the step-by-step, all-sided and consistent pursuit of the armed revolution and through the courageous struggles and sacrifices by Party cadres and members and by the revolutionary masses, the Party, the people̓s army, the mass movement and the revolutionary united front reached in the mid-1980s a level unprecedented in scope and strength since the Party̓s re-establishment, far beyond the highest level ever achieved by the armed revolution under the leadership of the old merger party.

 At the same time, there have been gross deviations and errors which have caused grievous damage to the Party and the revolutionary mass movement. There have also been other errors and shortcomings, which although not as serious, have nonetheless caused damage or served as a drag on the advance of the revolution. Impelled by petit-bourgeois impetuosity and subjectivism in te face of the vigorous advance of the revolution and the rapid decline of the U.S.-Marcos fascist dictatorship, there emerged inside the Party certain concepts of “advancing” the revolution that deviated from the basic principles and the theory and line of people̓s war, flew away from concrete conditions and the actual strength of the revolutionary forces and over-reached for a quick victory by skipping the necessary stages for advancing the revolution.

 The worst among these is the line combining the desire for urban armed insurrection and army “regularization”, that in the countryside encouraged military adventurist actions and the purely military viewpoint and, in the cities, actions and ideas of putschism and worship of the spontaneous masses. The obsession with urban insurrection and the premature build-up of higher but as yet unsustainable military formations (companies and battalions) and top-heavy staff structures, deprived the countryside of cadres urgently needed for mass work. These are misrepresented as adjustments or refinements on the theory and practice of people̓s war or otherwise as a superior theory or strategy. Thus, we are plagued by a reduction of mass base and other concomitant problems that in gravity are also unprecedented in the experience of the re-established Party.

 The serious deviations and errors were not identified, criticised and repudiated for a long time. These were allowed to spread and influence a portion of the Party organization and created a great amount of disorientation and damage, and then to harden to the point of rejecting criticism and rectification, and now to a degree these threaten the very life of the Party and the revolutionary movement.

  However, the correct line and those who adhere to it still prevail and can further prevail over the wrong line. It should be made clear, however, that we are still far stronger in several respects than in 1968, 1977 or 1980. The entire strength of the Party, the people̓s army and the mass movement in the countryside and the cities is more or less at the level we reached in 1983 or 1984. If we rectify the deviations and errors and take firm steps towards the correct course, the strength that we have achieved and maintained until today will be sufficient for us to continue advancing towards the last phase of the strategic defensive. There is firm ground for further leading the masses (arousing, organizing and mobilizing them) and launching the offensives (mass actions and armed tactical offensives) that we are capable of.

  The enemy was daydreaming when he boasted of being able to defeat the Party and the people in 1992 and 1993. The ruling system is wracked by an ever worsening political and economic crisis. There is increasing violence among the political factions of the exploiting classes. The pre-industrial semi-colonial and semi-feudal economy continues to be plundered by the local exploiting classes and the multinational firms and banks. The crisis drives the broad masses of the people to resistance and provides the fertile ground for the armed revolution and the legal democratic movement.

  We must stand firmly as proletarian revolutionaries like the Bolsheviks did when capitalism expanded rapidly to become modern imperialism in the period before World War I and the classical revisionists dominated the Second International and also like the communists did when they fought fascism during another period before, during and after World War II. We must stand firm and fight now in another dark period when capitalism seems to be unchallenged and unbeatable as a result of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the revisionist ruling parties and regimes and their replacement by undisguised bourgeois class dictatorship and capitalist regimes.

 The chronic crisis of the semi-colonial and semi-feudal social system is ever worsening and provides the conditions for the development of our protracted armed revolution. We see the ever-growing contradictions among the capitalist powers; between them and the increased number of debt-ridden neocolonies; between the local ruling classes and their foreign masters on the one hand and the oppressed and exploited peoples and nations on the other and betwen the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.

  All the counter-revolutionary campaigns of violence and deception will fail if the Party sums up its experience well, criticizes, repudiates and rectifies the major errors and deviations that have seriously damaged the Party and the revolutionary mass movement and now threaten their very life. The Party can further strengthen itself by basing itself on previous and continuing achievements, conducting criticism and self-criticism in an all-round rectification movement and correctly setting forth the new tasks.

  In the face of enemy assaults and of deviations and errors that have caused serious damage to the revolutionary forces and the people, we call on all Party cadres and members to reaffirm our basic principles, identify and rectify the major deviations, errors and shortcomings and strengthen our Party ideologically, politically and organizationally.

  Despite the adverse results leading to the drastic decline in our strength in certain areas, there are still some elements who persist in their impetuosity and there are others who swing from an ultra-Left position to a Rightist position. It is of crucial importance that we trace the ideological, political and organizational roots of our major errors and shortcomings, understand the circumstances in which these arose and recognize their harmful effects, so that we can correctly take our bearings and strengthen the Party and the revolutionary mass movement.

  There can be countless specific achievements and specific problems to cite. But our main objective in this document is to identify, criticize and rectify those major deviations, errors and shortcomings that have had the most considerable impact on the current status and further development of the Party and the revolutionary movement. While we conduct a wide-ranging review and study of our past practice and current circumstances, this is not intended to replace the summings-up and assessments of varying scope that must still be undertaken.

  In general, the Party still has considerable strength and vitality needed to solve the long-running problems and overcome the unprecedented setbacks. We can further strengthen ourselves and carry the revolution forward.

I. In The Field Of Ideology

  Without revolutionary theory, there can be no revolutionary movement. We can persevere in revolutionary struggle, promote the rights and interests of the people, stay on the correct line and win further victories only if we have firm ideological moorings. We must therefore undertake theoretical studies seriously.

  Political studies and activism are absolutely necessary in order to arouse, organize and mobilize the masses. But these are not enough. We must not limit ourselves to the study of the national situation from time to time. We also must not swing and sway with the current hype in the bourgeois mass media nor with pressures of unstable and unreliable allies. We must constantly be clear about our theory and our ideas. We must constantly be clear about the interests of the proletariat and the oppressed peole in our own country and throughout the world.

  We must maintain and further develop our Marxist-Leninist stand, viewpoint and method. We must constantly improve our knowledge of the materialist philosophy, historical materialism, political economy, scientific socialism, the new-democratic revolution, party building, people̓s war and the building of the united front.

  Since the re-establishment of the Party, theoretical study has had three levels: the basic level focusing on Philippine history, society and revolution and our own basic documents; the intermediate level, on the comparative study of the Philippine revolution with the Chinese and other revolutionary movements, using our seven-volume selections from Mao̓s works; and the advanced level, on the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist theory, using the most important works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao for reading and study by individual Party members and by Party branches.

  But since the late 1970s, we have increasingly departed from the fore-going structure of theoretical education and given less attention to the works of Mao. Writings of lesser importance and lesser relevance to our revolutionary struggle have gained more attention from Party members although in a superficial manner.

  Also since the late 1970s, except for the basic Party course and other sporadic educational drives of limited coverage, there has been a gross lack of study courses and study materials for theoretical education at the intermediate and advanced levels. New translations into Pilipino of the basic documents of our Party̓s re-establishment and other important basic writings were made and distributed in 1981-82 but only in limited number. The works of the great communist thinkers and leaders have also become scarce and unavailable to the Party rank and file.

 The undeniable consequence of this neglect of theoretical education is the widespread low level of theoretical knowledge among Party cadres and members, especially among those recruited since the late 1970s. There is a growing failure to evaluate the revolutionary experience of our own Party and people as well as foreign revolutionary experiences, past and current. There is also a growing failure to identify, criticize and combat the petit-bourgeois ideas and influences that emerge inside and outside the Party and are allowed to mislead our Party members and the revolutionary masses. Cadres with a low level of theoretical knowledge have been organizationally promoted and are prone to serious deviations and errors not only in ideology but also consequently in political and organizational work.

  There is wide ground for subjectivism, including the dogmatist and revisionist trends, to arise within the Party. Instead of having a comprehensive, complete and all-sided view of things and theoretical development from a proletarian revolutionary stand, there is a narrow, one-sided and fragmentary view of these, depending on which deviation certain elements wish to promote.

  For instance, there are elements who exaggerate the current role of their urban area of work and eclectically take out of historical context certain dramatic events, like the Petrograd and Moscow uprisings, the Vietnamese uprising of 1945, the Tet offensive of 1968 and the Nicaraguan final offensive of 1979 - in order to insist on the “autonomous/specific dynamism of urban struggle” (apart from the entire strategy) and devise a “new strategy” of armed urban insurrection and dogmatically superimpose it on or counterpose it to the entire theory and practice of pople̓s war.

  People̓s war does not exclude armed insurrection at the appropriate time, like the widespread revolutionary uprisings in many Philippine provinces in 1896-98 and 1898-99 against Spanish colonial rule and then against the U.S. war of aggression and those in Central Luzon in late 1944 and early 1945 against the collapsing Japanese forces. In their respective times, the Philippine revolutionary army and the Hukbalahap were the rallying points of the organized and spontaneous masses.

  A successful popular insurrection is premised on the disintegration of the counter-revolutionary army and on the existence of a new armed revolutionary force among other factors. To deny the necessity of developing people̓s war and building the people̓s army in stages, while the enemy force is still intact and not yet disintegrating, is not only to demagogically take advantage of a natural desire for quick victory but to lead the revolutionary forces to self-destruction.

  Even when the wholeness of a certain thing or process is well perceived and even when the two contradictory aspects are recognized, errors have been committed either in identifying which are the principal and the secondary aspects under certain conditions at a given time; or after identifying the principal aspect, in completely or virtually denying the secondary one.

  Take for instance the current of thought leading to the boycott error of 1986. The central leadership was correct in declaring that the 1986 snap presidential election was farcical and that Marcos would cheat and win the Comelec count. So up to a given set of circumstances and within a certain period of time, the principal aspect was obviously for Marcos to remain in power. Indeed, Marcos would “win” by Comelec count and Batasang Pambansa (the legislative) proclamation.

  But the secondary aspect could rise to the principal position upon a change of circumstances, like the U.S.-engineered military mutiny and the popular uprising that arose due to the convergence of both the organized reactionary forces (including the Catholic Church) and the progressive forces. As early as November 1985, the high potential of the secondary aspect rising to the principal position was already discernible.

  In the handling of contradictory aspects, error can also arise from trying to combine or reconcile the principal aspect with the secondary aspect. According to dialectical materialism, an entire thing or process can be understood by knowing both the principal aspect and the secondary aspects or in a complex thing or process, both the principal and the secondary contradictions.

  For example, one line is correct, like the strategic line of encircling the cities from the countryside in accordance with the theory of people̓s war. Another line is wrong, like aiming for total victory or a share of power with the bourgeoisie soon, without necessarily building the people̓s army in stages until it is strong enough to smash the bureaucratic-military machinery of the reactionary state in the cities. Thus, Party cadres, including those on the enemy manhunt list, concentrate in urban-based staff organs for the purpose of “preparing” for armed insurrection; and the people̓s army is pushed to build prematurely and unsustainably large combat formations and top-heavy military staff.

  The wrong line is not at all identified as such because it pays lip service to the theory of people̓s war and the leadership of the Party and also because it uses Party cadres and rides on — even while it undermines — the existing urban and rural mass base and contains certain elements of short-term validity like more effective offensives by bigger military formations before the mass base is greatly reduced or lost.

  Proposals for shifting to an “insurrectionary” strategy or the diminution of importance of base building and the anti-feudal struggle have been rejected, but these have not been thoroughly criticized. Worse, they have been allowed to persist in other guises such as aiming for the decisive victory of the revolution by means of the “strategic counteroffensive” within the strategic defensive and “seizing opportunities” by eans of an urban insurrection combined with “regularization” for the strategic counteroffensive.

  There is in effect a blending of the correct and wrong lines which allows the latter to make a big headway until the Party wakes up to the ultimate losses. In the absence of a clear and consistent criticism and rejection of what is wrong, the compromise allows the error to work like a parasite on the correct body of principles, the Party, the people̓s army and the revolutionary mass movement.

  The grossest example of failing to recognize the principal and secondary aspects of a certain thing or process pertains to Kampanyang AHOS (the anti-informer hysteria in Mindanao). The grave violations of civil rights, the unjust taking of the lives of comrades and other individuals and the attendant devastation of the revolutionary forces by this campaign are so strikingly clear and revolting. Yet for some time the campaign was deemed correct on the premise that it probably succeeded in eliminating real deep penetration agents even if hundreds upon hundreds of good comrades and innocent people were victimized and killed.

  Various reasons which are extraneous or of indirect relevance to the flow of events under the responsibility of the Mindanao Commission from the early 1980s to late 1986 are cited as the basic causes of Kampanyang AHOS. These cut off the real connection among the wrong ideological, political and organizational line; the resultant setbacks; and the anti-infiltrator hysteria. The worst proposition put forward by some elements is that Kampanyang AHOS was a revolutionary success.

 It is not a matter of arbitrary choice that in the structure of theoretical education a large part should be allotted to the study of the works of Mao and the Chinese revolution. Mao represents a stage of theory and practice which is a major development of Marxism-Leninism. His works bring Marxism-Leninism deeper into the East. And these arose from semi-colonial and semi-feudal conditions basically similar to those of the Philippines.

  The Chinese and the Vietnamese examples of people̓s war bear closer relevance to the current people̓s war in the Philippines than any other armed revolution abroad. These examples demonstrate that the chronic crisis of the semi-feudal conditions is the ground for a protracted people̓s war and, to this day, they remain the best available and most relevant to our struggle.

  We have learned basic principles from the Chinese revolution and Mao̓s works as the Vietnamese revolutionaries have. We have applied them according to our own conditions, never copying dogmatically nor mechanically any pattern of experience. Let us cite some important differences from the Chinese experience in people̓s war:

  (1) In addition to using the countryside to divide and weaken the forces of the enemy, we have used the archipelagic character of the country to further divide and weaken them.

  (2) The Chinese people̓s army used regular mobile warfare and established extensive base areas during the strategic defensive. Like the Vietnamese, we have done so with guerrilla warfare and guerrilla bases and zones.

  (3) A whole period of agrarian revolution involving peasant uprisings and confiscation of land preceded the more successful campaign of rent reduction and elimination of usury during the anti-Japanese struggle. We have pursued what we call the minimum program of the agrarian revolution before the maximum program.

 The objective conditions and the subjective forces of the current Philippine evolution are such that it can fulfil the two-stage revolution (new democratic and socialist) first defined by Lenin and elaborated on by Mao. The Philippine revolution is therefore similar to the Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean, Cuban and other revolutions which could proceed from the new democratic to the socialist stage. In this sense, our revolution belongs to a level higher than that of revolutions that have had to emerge from more backward colonial and even racist political and economic domination (like much of Africa) or those in which the revolutionary leadership is not determined to make a socialist revolution (like in Nicaragua).

 The worst kind of dogmatism resulting in the worst damage to the Party is the superimposition of the Sandinista paradigm or some aspects of or events in the Vietnamese revolution outside of their historical context on our successful practice of people̓s war in order to push for insurrectionism and the unacknowledged revival of the Jose Lava idea of quick military victory to push the purely military viewpoint and military adventurism. The seed ideas for these started to sprout and grow in influence at first within the central leadership in the early years of the 1980s, emerged as a clear insurrectionist line in Mindanao in 1983, and was subsequently propagated on a nationwide scale from the mid-1980s onward within the frame of the program for the “strategic counteroffensive”.

 In its documents of re-establishment, the Party took into full account the most important and essential facts of Philippine history and circumstances, in the class struggle and revolutionary movement in our country. In the ideological field, the most outstanding achievement of the Party is the integration of Marxist-Leninist theory and concrete Philippine conditions. This involves the identification of the basic conditions and current character of the Philippine revolution, its motive forces and enemies, its strategy and tactics, its tasks and its socialist perspective.

 The Party made a criticism of the various subjectivist errors — dogmatist, empiricist or revisionist, and “Left” or Right opportunist — of the previous leaderships of the first Communist Party (1930-38) and the merger party of the Socialist and Communist parties (1938 onward).

 Among the major subjectivist and opportunist errors criticized and repudiated was the Jose Leva adventurist line of quick military victory, building battalions and companies without building (through painstaking mass work) an extensive and deep-going mass base as their foundation. When we forget lessons from our own history, we are bound to repeat the errors.

      The line of spontaneous mass uprising and urban armed insurrection looks new and trendy because it flaunts the Sandinista paradigm or some paragraphs taken from some Vietnamese writings. But in fact, this line is also an unacknowledged recycling of the Sakdalista alsa puto, which had been correctly criticized and repudiated since the time of Comrade Crisanto Evangelista. As proletarian revolutionaries, we must learn from various revolutionary experiences abroad but we must know how to evaluate them according to their world significance, national context and relevance or applicability to our own people̓s struggle. It is a manifestation of low theoretical understanding, subjectivism and opportunism to rate any Sandinista leader as more significant or more relevant than Mao in terms of seizing political power and making social revolution. We must read the self-criticism of the FSLN after it lost power after ten years.

      We must grasp the fact fully that U.S. imperialism and the reactionary classes in the Philippines are not easy pushovers. Making revolution is not simply a matter of choosing from foreign models the easiest way to seize power. Otherwise, the coup d̓etat made by progressive army officers in the Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) would be the best model. Since 1969, it has been necessary to wage a protracted people̓s war in order to accumulate strength and build the organs of political power in the countryside. To rush the process of ultimately seizing the cities with notions of spontaneous mass uprising and quick military victor is to feed the small fish to the shark, to plunge into setbacks and defeats.

 From the mid-1970s onward, there seems to be a penchant among certain cadres for studying Bolshevik history and the works of Lenin. By itself, this is a good thing. It is even better if this is done within the context of our comprehensive theoretical education. But the effort by certain elements to apply the Bolshevik model on the Philippine revolution and at the same time diminish the importance of the works of Mao Zedong — which are the more relevant to the conditions of the Philippines — has encouraged a trend to deviate from the comprehensive structure of the basic, intermediate and advanced levels of theoretical education.

 The apparently avid students of Bolshevik history and Lenin eventually overfocused on the issue of the 1978 and 1986 elections and neatly divided themselves into the boycott and participation sides of the debate. Because the Party was banned by the enemy from participation, the boycott side always came out winner in the internal debates. Despite objections of Party cadres to the formulation of the issue as well as practical suggestions from them, the Party centre did not fully take into account how our Party conducted itself in the 1969 and 1971 elections and, of course, in reactionary institutions and organizations and how the Vietnamese comrades during the Vietnam war over-rode the electoral exercises staged by the Saigon regime.

 In late 1986 and 1987, there was the promotion of a tactical course on “political leadership” concentrating on Bolshevik history and strategy and tactics and on Lenin̓s work. The intention was to correct the erroneous application of the strategic and tactical principles of the Bolshevik revolution on the EDSA uprising and the post-EDSA political situation. At the same time, a Leninist course was promoted by the Manila-Rizal Regional Committee among their leading cadres. Because there were practically no other courses undertaken, these courses had the effect of squeezing out the further study of the theory and practice of people̓s war, encouraging an urban orientation which was used by some elements for pushing the notion of insurrectionism.

 Priorly in 1981, a view emerged within the central leadership itself and spread among some parts of the Party that neither the Bolshevik model nor the Chinese model is applicable to the Philippines. This further pushed the tendency to lessen the reading and study of the works of Mao and to deviate from the appropriate structure of our theoretical education.

 It was further encouraged by attacks on Mao Zedong in China with regard to the great leap forward and the great proletarian cultural revolution as well as by the lessened militance of the Chinese party in the world anti-imperialist movement. Albeit, the Chinese Communist Party did not attack Mao for his teachings on the new democratic revolution and the socialist transformation of Chinese society. These teachings continue to be valid and enlightening to the Philippine revolutionary movement.

 The dogmatic ambush was not only on the appropriate structure of our theoretical education but also on what should be our efforts to sum up our own rich experience of people̓s war and raise it to the level of theory. Instead, there is the preference to go back to a single foreign example or to a part of it in an attempt to validate an erroneous line — the line of urban insurrectionism — and to superimpose it on our living practice of people̓s war.

 Even while total victory has not yet been achieved in the new democratic stage of the Philippine revolution, the Party has acquired a lot of experience which can be studied and raised to the level of theory. It has created various forms of revolutionary forces. It has built red political power in a considerable portion of Philippine territory. It has yielded writings that are significant. But petit-bourgeois faddists get bored with the line of the Party and see no great achievement unless the cities are seized.

 Even at the present stage, the development of the Philippine revolutionary movement is of a level higher than that of other revolutionary movements which are better known in the intrnational press mainly because of the more backward forms of oppression (like outright colonialism and racism) that they contend with or because their national status has gained recognition in United Nations resolutions. But those who do not seriously study theory, under-rate the achievements of the Philippine revolution and over-rate foreign models on the basis of mere coverage in the world mass media and not on the basis of the potential and actual advances on the path of the two-stage revolution. ....

 Since the early 1980s, the deviation from the anti-revisionist line of the Party has been prompted by a desire for rapid military advances, be these the Jose Lava-type of quick military victory or the “strategic counteroffensive” within the strategic defensive. The National Democratic Front, like the Palestinian Liberation Organization and other liberation movements, could try to establish friendly relations with the revisionist ruling parties and regimes in the early 1980s. However, some elements wished to over-ride the pre-emptive relations between the Lava group and the revisionist ruling parties and even wanted to repudiate the anti-revisionist line of the Party in order to establish “fraternal” relations with these revisionist ruling parties and secure material assistance.

 In 1984, there was already the draft of a policy paper on the international situation and line on international relations, which toadied up to the Brezhnev ruling clique and unnecessarily attacked China even if the Soviet Union and its flunkeys in the Lava group were collaborating even more closely with the Marcos fascist regime. In 1985, this paper was read to the Central Committee plenum, which decided to subject it to further study.

 At any rate, it was circulated and promoted by the International Liaison Department until it was counteracted in 1987 and replaced in 1988 by a new policy paper which upheld the correct principles of party-to-party relations and the basic principles of socialism but accepted at face value the avowals of Gorbachov, with some amount of tactful critical observations.

 Thus, even beyond 1989 (collapse of revisionist regimes in Eastern Europe), the 28th CPSU Congress in 1990 and August 1991 (the coup and the banning of the CPSU), there are elements within the Party who continue to adulate Gorbachov on a simplistic notion of anti-Stalinism (which holds Stalin responsible even for the revisionist ruling parties and regimes since 1956) and do not believe that the revisionist ruling parties and regimes have collapsed and their “fallen” leaders (misleaders) and their relatives have characteristically become ex-communists and anti-communists, business entrepreneurs, openly milking the state enterprises and privatizing the social wealth of the proletariat and the people in collaboration with the flagrant anti-communist regimes which oppress and exploit the proletariat and people and persecute the genuine communists.

 The criticism and repudiation of modern revisionism are a basic component of the theoretical foundation and re-establishment of our Party. No leading organ can do away with the basic documents of the Congress of Re-establishment, short of a new congress. And why should anyone at this point consider doing away with the critique of modern revisionism or capitalist restoration when in fact it has been vindicated and proven by the blatant restoration of the class dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and capitalism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union? The shame that properly belongs to the Lava revisionist group should not be shifted to or shared by the Paty.

 Inside and outside the Party, there are a few but articulate elements espousing ideas of insurrectionism, populism, liberalism, social democracy and the like who have been influenced by the swindling and wrecking operations of the Gorbachovite crew in the Soviet Union and who have derided, denigrated and attacked the basic principles of the Party. Just as it is important to take the most responsible among them to account for celebrating Aquino in the past as the champion of democracy and economic recovery, let us take them to account for continuing to celebrate Gorbachov as the ideologist of “socialist renewal and democracy” (in fact the restoration of capitalism, bourgeois class dictatorship and disintegration of the Soviet Union).

 The glib advertising job of Gorbachov drummed up the total negation of Marxism-Leninism and the entire course of Bolshevik history; the accelerated capitalist restructuring and the breakdown of production; the rise of the bourgeois class dictatorship; the unleashing of nationalism, ethnic conflicts and civil war; and the emergence of all kinds of monsters, including racism, fascism and rampant criminality.

 The imperialists and those who echo them wish the proletarian revolutionaries in the Philippines to become shamed and demoralized by the collapse of the revisionist ruling parties and regimes and to give up Marxism-Leninism and the Philippine revolution. Let it be stated forthrightly that the theory of Marxism-Leninism has proven to be the correct guide in the making of the new democratic revolution and in laying the political and economic foundation of the socialist system.

 At the same time, the Party recognizes that the truly new great challenge for Marxist-Leninist theoretical and practical work is the problem of combating modern revisionism, preventing the restoration of capitalism and continuing the socialist revolution. The greatest contribution of Mao to Marxist-Leninist theory is the recognition of this problem and his attempt to solve it. That attempt met with temporary success for a number of years but eventually failed. The Paris Commune of 1871 succeeded briefly and failed. But the theory of proletarian revolution and proletarian dictatorship was not invalidated by the failure of the Paris Commune. After 46 years, the first proletarian state would arise.

 It took thirty to forty years to build socialism, proletarian dictatorship and socialist economic construction among more than a billion people and it took another thirty to forty years for modern revisionism to peacefully evolve into blatant capitalism and the full restoration of bourgeois class dictatorship in several countries.

 It is an advantage for the Philippine revolution that while it is still at the new democratic stage it has seen how socialism was built elsewhere only to be subverted and destroyed. We, as proletarian revolutionaries, have the advantage of availing ourselves of proven Marxist-Leninist theory in the new democratic revolution and the socialist revolution and construction as well as of learning lessons from the peaceful evolution of socialism to capitalism and prospectively from an inevitable resurgence of the anti-imperialist and socialist movement. By learning positive and negative lessons in revolutionary history, the Philippine revolution will have the opportunity to contribute to the effort of building socialism and preventing the restoration of capitalism in more effective ways.

 In the meantime, especially after the bourgeois euphoria over the downfall and disintegration of the revisionist ruling parties and regimes,we witness today the aggravated problems of the world capitalist system. The most developed capitalist countries are increasingly in contradiction with each other over economic, financial, trade and security matters. High technology is accelerating the insoluble capitalist crisis of overproduction. High productivity is in contradiction with the shrinking of the world market. The monopoly capitalist sale of goods and services to the client states can be maintained only by loans that cannot be paid back. The client states are debt-ridden and are squeezing each other out in the export trade, yielding no surplus to save them from further indebtedness but incurring more budgetary and trade deficits.

 In fact social turmoil and violent upheavals are occurring with increasing frequency throughout the world, despite the peace rhetoric of the “new world order”. Food riots, coups and countercoups, ethnic strife, civil wars, and various types of violence are bursting out in the third world and in the new client states of imperialism in the East. Even in the capitalist countries, the economic recession is causing unemployment, cutting down social welfare measures, generating social tensions and breeding racism and racist violence against workers from the third world.

                 In due time, from the new world disorder, the anti-imperialist and socialist movements will resurge. By force of circumstances, the Marxist-Leninist parties that retain their proletarian revolutionary integrity and continue to wage revolutionary struggles and some parties that will re-emerge in countries where revisionist parties have disintegrated or degenerated will spring up once more to wage revolutionary struggles at a new and higher level under the theoretical guidance of Marxism-Leninism and under the banner of proletarian internationalism....

The Situation of the Rectification Movement and the Revolutionary Movement

Assessment by the Executive Committee of the Central Committee, July 1995

 The Party̓s rectification movement, its consolidation on the theoretical foundation of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought and its revitalization under the guidance of the general line of the people̓s democratic revolution are advancing vigorously.

      As a result, the reactionary U.S.-Ramos regime̓s total war and psychological warfare scheme to crush the revolutionary movement have collapsed. Totally defeated as well were the desperate attempts of the revisionist renegades to liquidate the revolution from within after the extreme harm that they had inflicted by being the main promoters of military adventurism and urban insur-rectionism. By repudiating the grave deviations and disorientation, by consciously upholding the proletarian revolutionary line and setting tasks firmly based on concrete conditions, the Party has rid itself of serious vulnerabilities to frontal and outflanking attacks from open and concealed enemies.

      The Party has identified and repudiated the worst and principal forms of deviation and error of the past. “Left” opportunism was identified and exposed and so was Right opportunism which further surfaced after “Let” adventurism had taken a big beating in practice.

      The revolutionary organizations have expanded vigorously. We have stopped the trend of contraction of the guerrilla fronts and reversed it towards renewed expansion. But the adverse effects of past deviations, weaknesses and losses continue to linger. Though less than before, there is still some decrease in the total number of the organized mass base and full-time forces.

      There is unevenness in advancing the work of rectification and recovery among the regions. The process has been more complicated, difficult and prolonged than we had previously estimated. The actual damage is bigger and more severe and its full extent was revealed only in the process of summing-up and rectification. The Party̓s understanding of the rectification movement, as in other big battles, went through a process of deepening and widening, of twists and turns, and of struggles.

      The rectification movement has been encumbered not only by the unremitting attacks of the reactionary U.S.-Ramos regime, the revisionism and opportunism peddled by the revisionist renegades and the reformist wind whipped up by the reactionaries and anti-communist petit-bourgeois groups which have joined the imperialist ideological offensive. Another big obstacle was the accumulation of internal weaknesses resulting from long-standing and serious disorientation, shortcomings and losses.

      We must wage the struggle painstakingly to overcome the damage and advance anew. We must have the determination to deepen the rectification movement and strengthen the foundation for renewed advance. Likely, we shall need the rest of this year and next year for completing the process of rectification and totally overcoming the damage. Likely also within next year, our advances in the struggle and expansion of organized strength will become solid.

      The rectification movement must be carried through to the end and the Party further consolidated ideologically, politically and organizationally. The reactionary ruling system is wracked by a severe political and economic crisis. When the situation of the Party improves through the rectification movement, its revolutionary leadership will surely be enhanced among the people and the armed revolution will surely advance.

 The Party has regained strength in the course of intense struggles against the total war and reactionary rule of the U.S.-Ramos regime, against the revisionism and capitulationism peddled by the revisionist traitors, and against petit-bourgeois reformism, as well as against its own grave internal weaknesses and shortcomings. Its commitment and unity based on the principles of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought, on the general line of the people̓s democratic revolution and on the strategic line of encircling the cities from the countryside, is firmer and clearer. Revisionism, dogmatism and empiricism, Right and “Left” opportunism, bureaucratism, ultra-democracy and liquidationism are steadfastly being repudiated. The internal foundations for resolutely advancing the revolution are stronger.

      In the last few years, the rectification movement itself is our most important victory in upholding Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought and integrating it with our concrete practice. It is a proof of our Party̓s enduring Marxist-Leninist foundation and its capability to unreservedly and self-critically analyze its own practice from a thoroughly proletarian-revolutionary viewpoint. While the revisionist traitrs are wallowing ever deeper in the rut of capitulationism and decay, the Party is resolutely repudiating the past errors and shortcomings and is persevering along the revolutionary path.

      The basic documents of the second thorough-going rectification movement present a comprehensive analysis of the crucial questions in the theory and practice of the Philippine revolution over the past decade and a half. These questions on line, strategy and policies stem primarily from the positive and negative experiences of the Philippine revolution. At the same time, the big struggles that shook the international proletarian movement from the rise and eventual collapse of modern revisionism have a strong bearing on these questions. Thus, the rectification movement fosters the understanding of the Party and the working class of the Marxist-Leninist line of advance not only in the present but also in the subsequent stages of the revolution.

      The Party actively leads in defending and upholding the theory and practice of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought against modern revisionism, opportunism and other bourgeois and petit-bourgeois lines. Aside from efforts inside the country, the Party participates and leads in convening international conferences to uphold Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought. We are undertaking theoretical and historical researches and publishing works contributing to the study of experiences in socialist revolution and in the struggle against modern revisionism. The Party is vigorously propagating the anti-revisionist line and the theory of continuing revolution under proletarian dictatorship in order to combat the systematic anti-socialist propaganda of the imperialists, echoed by the revisionist renegades in anti-Stalin, anti-Mao and anti-communist attacks.

      To guide the study and practice of its units and members, the Party publishes in Rebolusyon and Ang Bayan timely analyses and explanation of outstanding national and international issues. The Party militantly combats pro-imperialist and reformist lines and views in dealing with such issues as peace, environment, development, women, national minorities and human rights as well as the reformist use of these issues in attempting to cover up the fundamental and principal issues of imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat capitalism. Thus, the class stand and correct revolutionary orientation in dealing with principal national and international issues are strengthened anew and previous strong influences of subjectivism and petit-bourgeois opportunism are repudiated.

  The rectification movement consists mainly of summing up and criticism and self-criticism. Its propagation and deepening consists of a widespread study of the central documents of rectification and, guided by these, summings-up of experiences at the lower levels and spheres. Basic revolutionary principles are being studied through a comprehensive understanding of concrete experiences over the past decade and a half.

      Comprehensive summings-up at the regional level and of main lines of work are important to enable these to thoroughly grasp the conclusions and lessons drawn by the central rectification documents. These are necessary especially because the longstanding and serious deviations, errors and shortcomings have resulted in disorientation seeping down to the basic levels. So as to be able to thoroughly repudiate the deviations and errors and lay a firm foundation for renewed advance, we must make rectification and self-criticism permeate the entire Party.

      At fist impact after the Tenth Plenum of the Central Committee, the outstanding question in the rectification movement was the correct view of the entire experience of the Party in the last decade and a half. The focus was on national policies and programs decided by the Party̓s central leadership. These questions were further sharpened by the all-out anti-rectification and anti-Party campaign launched by the revisionist traitors.

      As the process of summing-up reached the regions and the main lines of work in 1993 and 1994, the Party̓s comprehension of its past experiences was further enriched. We could then focus more attention on experiences with regard to applying the line, policies and national plans at the intermediate and basic levels. The deviations and damage as well as their manifestations at the lower levels, in the localities and in the direct relations of the Party and the people̓s army with the masses were identified even more concretely, thoroughly and sharply.

      All regional committees have already taken a correct stand on the principal issues and events of the past, in accordance with the rectification movement and basic revolutionary principles. Almost all units have completed their comprehensive summings-up. Regional committees and national staff organs which have yet to complete comprehensive summings-up have undertaken a thorough assessment of their forces and work, or have taken a stand on the outstanding issues of line and principles concerning the struggle against the revisionist renegades.

      Among certain units, summing-up has been delayed and the rectification movement has yet to go into full swing due to the urgency of having to confront the sabotage and trouble-making of the revisionist traitors. However, in some other units, the delay also comes from the impact of disorientation and wrong views. For instance, some are still influenced by centrism, bourgeois liberalism and sentimentalism and continue to deny the existence of a two-line struggle within the Party and the centrality of such a struggle in building a genuine Marxist-Leninist party. They refuse to recognize or they cannot comprehend the simultaneous existence and struggle of the proletarian and bourgeois lines in the past and even in the present circumstances of the Party. Thus, they continue to question, though not forthrightly, the need for a rectification movement.

      There are also some units that stood firmly against the worst manifestations of the deviations and errors peddled by the revisionist renegades but easily became complacent or satisfied with the superficial analysis of their experience and the situation within their own sphere. They reject and repudiate the errors of others but they fall short when it comes to critically analyzing and criticizing themselves.

      In some units, erroneous views continue to arise regarding the dialectical interaction between the summing-up of the whole and of its parts and between the self-criticism of the higher organs and that of the lower organs. Some hold the view that they are not involved or responsible for the serious deviations carried into the program of action implemented by the entire Party for almost a decade. They tend to overemphasize the particularity of their spheres of work, look only at how they differ from those who committed the most severe manifestations of deviation and overlook the fact that, like the latter, they too had committed serious violations of the line and basic principles, though not extremely.

      There are also those who put the blame on the higher organs and regard themselves as merely having been “swayed”, “victimized” or having “followed” the errors from above. They reduce the practice of the Party, people̓s army and the masses in one locality or line of work into a mere organizational question regarding the relation between higher and lower levels, instead of analyzing and fully comprehending their practice at their own level, with its particularity and integrity, as products of the integration of the line and policies of the Party with their own concrete situation and practice. By blaming the higher organs, especially concerning the practice of morethan one decade, they in fact deny responsibility at their own level and within their particular area.

      These erroneous views result in the chopping up of our past experiences, selectivity in criticism and rectification of deviations and errors, or avoidance of raising issues to the level of questions of line and principle. Efforts at rectification do not go beyond the superficial criticism of the worst deviations of others. The desire to avoid blame and pass it on to others distorts the summing-up and rectification, which is the scientific and critical study of concrete experience to raise our understanding of the principles and theory of making revolution. Instead of earnestly upholding the principles and unity of the Party, such a desire breeds distrust, narrow localism and departmentalism. Thus, efforts at rectification are haphazard and consolidation work is hampered; the internal foundation for decisively recovering from our grave losses and advancing firmly are not laid.

      Thorough-going rectification demands the correct, critical and comprehensive analysis of concrete experiences at all levels and important lines of work. We must identify and rectify the primary forms and manifestations of deviations, errors and shortcomings at all levels and lines of work. We must also raise our understanding of our experiences to the level of the struggle between the proletarian revolutionary line and the bourgeois counterrevolutionary line within the Party. We must finish the summings-up of all the regions and improve our comprehension and summing-up of the rich experiences at the intermediate and basic levels. We must also finish the summings-up of principal lines of work, especially united front work, army building and mass work in the countryside, to enable us to consolidate and sharpen our summing-up of experiences and further develop the particular policies and methods of work.

      Because the cadres and members of the Party have started to uphold the basic principles and rectify past errors and shortcomings, we will certainly surmount the remaining internal obstacles and arrive at a higher level of unity on the principal questions. Still, we must continue to be vigilant, uphold the spirit of thoroughness in rectification and resoluteness in struggle so as to decisively overcome the most serious deviations, errors and shortcomings. We must continue to be steadfast in our principles and have a broad view so as to thoroughly get rid of erroneous concepts, harmful habits, corruption and various forms of bureaucratism left over by serious deviations and shortcomings of the past.

      Empiricism and revisionism took big blows from the rectification movement and Party cadres and members are combating these with heightened consciousness. But we must continue to be vigilant. Empiricism and revisionism will continue to pose a big danger for as long as theoretical education on the three-level Party course is not firmly being carried out; the study and propagation of the theory and history of scientific socialism, the international communist movement and the struggle against revisionism are not sustained and thorough-going; and haphazardness and eclecticism in theory and principles are not thoroughly overcome. While we are still reeling from the impact of the damage and we have not firmed up our renewed advance, there will be tremendous difficulties in the revolution on which empiricism and revisionism can flourish.

      Dogmatism continues to pose a big danger due to the widespread influence of the previous dogmatic style of study and work. The penchant for seeking foreign models and formulas to impose uncritically upon our concrete conditions and practice existed for a long time. In studying the experiences from other countries and the concrete situation of the Philippine revolution, many comrades had the propensity to simply draw parallels, often very arbitrarily. The previous healthy practice of giving importance to social investigation and class analysis had long been neglected and swamped by the craving for formulas and schemes for a shortcut to victory. Dogmatism was fostered by, and in turn fostered, bureaucratism and commandism.

  In 1994, the revisionist renegades were further exposed and isolated and this accelerated the disintegration of the groups they were able to deceive and sway. We completed the expulsion of their active operators from organizations led and influenced by the revolutionary movement and thus removed the biggest internal obstacle to the further strengthening of these organizations. In the main, although still intense, the struggle against the sabotage work of the revisionist traitors is now only secondary to undertaking thorough-going rectification and consolidation of the organizations and the tasks of the Party.

 The revisionist renegades were quickly isolated as soon as their complete ideological, political and organizational bankruptcy became exposed. Until the early part of 1993, the renegades tried to pose as loyal Party members and instigated an anti-rectification and anti-Party barrage through a campaign of lies and venom against the central leadership. But before long, after the vast majority of Party members denounced them, they were compelled to totally reveal their revisionist, capitulationist and collaborationist line in their bid to consolidate the groups they had deceived. They poured out their hostility towards Marxism-Leninism, the people̓s democratic revolution and people̓s war. From their previous insistence on military adventurism and urban insurrectionism, they turned to blatant anti-communism and capitulationism, and thus, completely exposed the single revisionist core of their old and current bourgeois line.

      Apart from their revisionism and capitulationism, the revisionist traitors are wallowing ever deeper in corruption. While the chief traitors luxuriate and indulge themselves in the cities, the small bands whom they have misled in the countryside are being completely mired in gangsterism and roving rebel practices. Whether in the cities or in the countryside, the masses despise them for being saboteurs and wreckers.

      The revisionist renegades and their counter-revolutionary line and wrecking operations are the worst representations and consequences of the grave deviations and shortcomings in the past. They stand as negative examples, underscoring the reality and intensity of the struggle between the proletarian line and bourgeois line within the Party. If we do not resolutely advance the ideological, political and organizational consolidation of the Party, if we do not heighten proletarian vigilance, the bourgeois and petit-bourgeois line will gain ground and strength, mislead and cause severe damage. This lesson, for which we have paid dearly, should never be forgotten.

  Next to summings-up and self-criticism, the most important component of the rectification movement is advancing the Party̓s three-level course for theoretical education. The long-standing gross negligence in conducting the three-level education course and as a consequence the poor theoretical level of Prty cadres and leading committees set the basic conditions for the outgrowth and worsening of disorientation and errors in the past.

 Since the Tenth Plenum of the Central Committee, there has been a marked improvement in the propagation of the writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao within the Party. The dissemination of Party documents — from the documents of re-establishment, the first comprehensive rectification movement, up to the second rectification movement and the current Party publications — has also markedly improved. The initiative to propagate Marxist-Leninist-Maoist writings come from the central leadership and from the leading committees in the regions. The translation of these into Pilipino and various local languages have also been revitalized in order to address the needs of the overwhelming majority of the Party members who are unable to read the English texts. There is a marked increase of and heightened enthusiasm for collective and individual reading and study within the Party.

      However, attention on the three-level Party course based on the outline approved by the Tenth Plenum was delayed. At the outset, time and attention of leading cadres and committees was focused mainly on combating the all-out anti-Party campaign and, subsequently, on the summings-up of the regional committees and main lines of work. The setting up of the machinery for education and instruction was also delayed.

      At the current stage of the rectification movement, the main emphasis is on completing and propagating the three-level course. The courses are being improved and targeted for completion and propagation within the current year. The Party is determined to tackle the problem of having a poor theoretical grounding. It is the Party̓s fundamental task to arm the cadres and members of the Party with sufficient knowledge of the theory of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought. This is the requisite for enabling them to improve and understand — at the level of theory and principles — their positive and negative experiences in the past, more effectively combat revisionism and other forms of opportunism and actively contribute to the development of the Party̓s revolutionary study and practice.

      National organs and most regions have their respective cadre core with the capability to lead the theoretical education at their levels and areas. But long neglect has considerably diminished their ranks. A large bulk of the Party̓s cadres was recruited towards the end of the ̓70s and throughout the ̓80s, that is, at a time that serious disorientation and neglect of theoretical education and ideological building prevailed. A majority of leading committee members in the regions have a superficial acquaintance even of Mao̓s writings which are closest to the situation and problems of the Philippine revolution. Many cadres and members lack knowledge even of the history of the Philippine revolution. Their knowledge with regard to the theory of scientific socialism, modern revisionism and the history of the international communist movement is even more lacking.

      Neglect of the study of theory and principles had prevailed for a long time and bred a bad style in study and work which we must uproot with all our might and replace with the scientific and militant style of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought.

 We must provide the necessary time, personnel and resources for education work. All capable leading cadres must directly lead and participate in this work. We must have a plan for producing and training many more instructors at the different levels. We must systematically and constantly promote the translation, reproduction and distribution, as well as collective and individual reading, of our Party publications and other Marxist-Leninist-Maoist works at various levels and scopes.

      Deepening the rectification movement means more thorough-going repudiation of the serious deviations and errors through the repudiation of their principal forms and manifestations at different levels, areas and lines of work. It also means decisively overcoming the serious deviations and errors at the theoretical level and deepening and broadening the entire Party̓s knowledge of the theory of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought and of the history of the Philippine revolution and the international communist movement. Concurrently, we must further consolidate the Party ideologically, politically and organizationally, set the correct tasks and with all our might reinvigorate our revolutionary work and struggles.

 To further advance and deepen the rectification movement and ideological consolidation, let us set ourselves to accomplish the following tasks:

  1. Complete the summings-up of the regional committees and main lines of work. Let the spirit of self-criticism and rectification prevail at all levels and in all areas.

  2. Raise the entire Party̓s level of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist consciousness and vigilantly oppose revisionism, subjectivism and other manifestations of the bourgeois and petit-bourgeois line.

  3. Complete the three-level Party course and give the highest priority to its propagation and study.

  4. Broaden the efforts to translate, reproduce and distribute Marxist-Leninist-Maoist writings as well as our Party publications.

  5. Step up research work and studies on theory and history. Encourage more research and studies on the history and current situation of Philippine society, specific characteristics of our people̓s war and the history of the international communist movement and the struggle against revisionism.

  6. Step up propaganda within and outside the Party on Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought, the line of the people̓s democratic revolution and scientific socialism.

  7. Raise the entire Party̓s understanding of the particular characteristics and requirements of our people̓s war by drawing on the knowledge of the history and the experiences of the past decade and more as enriched several times over through the rectification movement....