Anti-APEC groups gear up for protest<\/p>\n
By Katherine Espina<\/p>\n
MANILA (Reuter): A security crackdown by the Philippine
\ngovernment has made opponents of the Asia Pacific Economic
\nCooperation summit more determined than ever that the world hears
\ntheir views during this month's meeting in Manila.<\/p>\n
\"Efforts of (the) government to thwart our plans to launch
\nanti-APEC activities with the arrest of Filemon Lagman, have only
\nspurred us to redouble our efforts,\" Renato Constantino, national
\nchairman of the Sanlakas leftist group, told Reuters.<\/p>\n
The Philippine government's obsession with security for the
\nNov. 25 APEC summit has triggered unpopular measures, including
\nthe arrest of Lagman and a ban on the entry of East Timorese
\nindependence leader and Nobel Peace laureate Jose Ramos Horta.<\/p>\n
President Fidel Ramos and other officials say last week's
\ndetention of Lagman, one of the country's most powerful leftist
\nleaders, was not connected with APEC but was the result of fresh
\nevidence in a 1992 murder investigation.<\/p>\n
\"Few Filipinos, including those who applaud the move, believe
\nthem,\" the Philippine Daily Inquirer newspaper said in an
\neditorial.<\/p>\n
Sanlakas is one of four groups planning counter-conferences
\nand other protest actions during the summit and the APEC
\nministerial meeting that precedes it on Nov. 22-23.
\nSanlakas said it expects some 6,000 participants at its
\nconference.<\/p>\n
\"They are selling APEC like it's the panacea to all our
\nproblems. At our forum, we will discuss the effects of
\nglobalization on the working people and come up with
\nrecommendations to defend ourselves,\" said Constantino.<\/p>\n
Leftist groups say the APEC goal of full trade and investment
\nliberalization would only benefit industrial countries like the
\nUnited States and Japan, and widen disparities between them and
\nless advanced economies.<\/p>\n
Anti-APEC groups are not going to just talk, however. Two are
\nplanning protest motorcades comprising several hundred cars
\ndriving from Manila to the summit venue at Subic, some 80 km (50
\nmiles) north of the capital.<\/p>\n
There are also plans to try to stage a protest march to the
\ngates of Subic itself and to form local fishermen's boats into a
\nprotest flotilla and sail into Subic, a former U.S. naval base.
\nPolitical analysts said the most influential, and most moderate,
\nof the four anti-APEC groups is the Caucus of Development Non-
\nGovernment Organizations (Code-NGO).<\/p>\n
Code-NGO has discussed its view with the government on APEC
\nand some of its recommendations have been incorporated into the
\nPhilippines' Individual Action Plan (IAP).<\/p>\n
\"We were able to introduce language and concepts into the
\nPhilippines' action plan,\" Danilo Songco, national coordinator of
\nCode-NGO, said in an interview.<\/p>\n
\"The most notable is that government has agreed to our
\nproposal of deleting a uniform five percent tariff by the year
\n2004,\" he said.<\/p>\n
The Philippines has instead opted for a target of three to ten
\npercent by that date.<\/p>\n
Each of APEC's member economies has had to submit an IAP,
\ndetailing how it plans to reach the grouping's goal of lowering
\nall trade barriers by 2020.<\/p>\n
Some 5,000 organizations and cooperatives are expected at Code
\nNGO's two-day conference on Nov. 20-21, Songco said.<\/p>\n
One of the most vocal anti-APEC groups is the Manila People's
\nForum, whose invitation to Nobel peace prize laureate Jose Ramos-
\nHorta was thwarted by the government.<\/p>\n
\"We are not out to embarrass the government. We are pushing
\nthrough with the forum where we hope to ventilate the opinions of
\nthose negatively affected by APEC,\" Walden Bello, chairman of the
\ninternational conveners' committee of the Manila Peoples' Forum
\non APEC (MPFA), told Reuters.<\/p>\n
Bello said their Nov. 21-24 counter-summit will have 250
\nforeign delegates and about the same number of local
\nparticipants.<\/p>\n
The People's Forum is organizing one of the Subic motorcades.
\nA fourth group, the leftist Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan, or
\nNew Patriotic Alliance) in alliance with the Kilusang Mayo Uno
\n(KMU, or May the First Movement), says up to 20,000 people are
\nexpected to take part in its motorcade to Subic on Nov. 24.
\nAn estimated 200,000 people are expected to join a nationwide
\nprotest planned for the same day.<\/p>\n
Bayan secretary-general Nathaniel Santiago said the group will
\nalso hold a \"peoples' conference\" on Nov. 21-23.<\/p>\n
Political analyst Alex Magno believes that, apart from Code-
\nNGO, most of the protests will deviate from the issues on APEC.<\/p>\n
\"Most of these radicals just want media attention and will
\nengage in these protests to inflate their political influence,\"
\nsaid Magno, a political science professor at the state-run
\nUniversity of the Philippines.<\/p>",
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