Armed Conflict In The Philippines

2.2 Synthesis and Gaps
The more than four decades old of internal armed conflict In the Philippines is being waged principally by the two ‘non-state armed groups’, characterized by two major ‘non-international armed conflicts —the CPP-NPA-NDF, collectively known as the CNN (Maoist insurgents), and the MNLF-MILF-ASG (Muslim secessionists) (Santos and Santos: 2010; Ferrer and Cabangbang: 2012). This ‘tale of two insurgencies’, while having different aims, strategy, ideology, and geographical setting, share common denominators that could be traced to the structural problems that best Philippine society --poverty, injustice, inequality and the marginalization of the oppressed. (Santos and Santos: 2010; Ferrer and Cabangbang: 2012). The failure

(IPSP: 2011) “Insurgency cannot be viewed from a strictly state-focused perspective, that is, it is not a threat to the sovereignty of the state alone... more than the threat it poses to our democracy and institutions, insurgency and armed conflict threatens the way of life, safety, and security of Filipinos and therefore, addressing the problem is something that cannot be done by the military

from a purely military approach, to right-hand-left-hand approach, to the whole-of-government and finally the whole-of-nation approach, we can see that focus of these approaches has also evolved from a purely enemy-centric to people-centric. (Devesa:2005; Hernandez:2006; Edjawan:2012)This is exactly what the IPSP Bayanihan is espousing. Guided by the government’s policy framework that promotes peace as the centerpiece of its internal security program (NSP:2011-2016), the AFP asan instrument of national policy started to implement in 2011 a new campaign plan tailored-fit for the military’s role in the overall government internal peace and security framework. (Oreta and Tolosa: 2012) The plan espoused a new paradigm for the AFP --a shift from a state-security focused which is based on the constitution that mandates the AFP to be the “protector of the people and the state”(Art. II, Sec. 3, 1987 Constitution) to a people-centered focus --whereby it puts people’s security at the heart of its military operation. (Oreta and Tolosa: 2012) This ‘paradigm shift’ is like the AFP venturing into a virtually unfamiliar territory, whereas before soldiers are used to being oriented towards the destruction and defeat of the enemy; now, the plan requires the soldiers to completely depart from that old paradigm and instead embrace a new paradigm that puts primacy on the protection and welfare of the people.