Communists Run Shadow Government : Rebels Active in Town Named Marcos

Communist rebels have established a shadow government and are collecting taxes in this northern town named for the family of Ferdinand E. Marcos--a fierce anti-Communist during his 20-year rule.

Local military and civilian officials say this town of 12,000 people that is 230 miles north of Manila became a rebel stronghold after the former president fled to Hawaii in the 1986 military-civilian uprising that propelled Corazon Aquino to power.

“In the time of Marcos, they were only in the mountains,” Mayor Felicito Tamayo said of the rebel New People’s Army. “Now they have been able to reverse that. It’s as if the timing was great--Communists entering and Marcos leaving.”

Marcos town is about 10 miles south of Sarrat, where the former president was born 71 years ago. The town’s 13 outlying hamlets, mostly named for members of Marcos’ family, have become gateways for guerrillas to slip down from the mountains into populous areas of Ilocos Norte province.

Rebels ‘Just Pass Through’

“They just pass through,” said Melecio Duldulao, 45, chief of the hamlet of Imelda, named for Marcos’ wife. “Occasionally, when they come at lunchtime, we ask them to join us. But that’s all.”

Tamayo said the rebels have killed civilians, seized private property for their “revolutionary agrarian reform” and have forced businesses to pay protection money, or what they call “revolutionary taxes.”

On March 1, army troops raided a 14-acre rebel training camp less than 2 miles from the town. The camp, which was abandoned, contained obstacle courses and a makeshift clinic.

Tamayo said the rebel activity has created a climate of fear in the town that civilian and military officials appear powerless to stop.

“By 6 p.m., you should have already eaten and gone home,” Tamayo said. “Then make sure all the windows are closed.”

Try to Stay Neutral

Townspeople say they try to remain neutral in the conflict but find themselves increasingly drawn into the cycle of violence.

“Cory arrived and the New People’s Army arrived,” said Helen Abrigado, wife of a town official. “We are really having a hard time. We are afraid. If we see the (rebels), we get scared. When we see the military we also get scared.”

Duldulao said the rebels began infiltrating his hamlet, about a mile east of the town center, in 1984. Four years later, they killed Artemio Manguma, leader of the village security volunteers and a suspected military informant, he said.

Several months later, rebels tied up Duldulao in front of his eight children but released him after his wife, Milagros, persuaded them that he had no links to the military.

Collect Taxes

“They have organized in the (village) level,” said Brig. Gen. Bayani Fabic, northern Luzon commander. “They have organized economic committees and are already collecting taxes.”

The army’s 45th Infantry Battalion operates in the area, and Fabic has stepped up intelligence-gathering operations against the shadow governments, which he considers the principal threat.

“To us, the armed component is easy to control,” Fabic said, referring to armed guerrillas. “But to uproot the political structure of the shadow government, that is a very tedious process.”

Mediating Role for Church

Rev. Rock Bonoan, a spokesman for the Roman Catholic archdiocese, said the church plays a leading role in mediating between the military and the rebels. He said priests often must defend parishioners accused by the military of sympathizing with the rebels, whose insurgency is 20 years old.

“Most of them are victims in this war,” Bonoan said. “People are branded Communist rebels even before they become one.”

Last May, gunmen who Bonoan said were believed to be soldiers massacred a family of five in the nearby town of Vintar.