RP Communists to boycott polls

Sat, 27 Dec 1997 | Source: AFP

MANILA (AFP): Philippine Communist guerrillas will boycott next year's elections but are open to "cooperation" with parties helping to determine President Fidel Ramos' successor, a rebel leader said yesterday.

"The revolutionary government has its own government and the upcoming polls are the political exercise of the other government," Communist Party of the Philippines founder Jose Maria Sison said over radio station DZRH.

"In principle we should not involve ourselves in the elections, meaning no members will participate in the process," he said in an interview from exile in the Netherlands.

However Sison added: "If there are parties and candidates who are willing to talk with us they are welcome to talk with us in any manner of cooperation that they want to achieve."

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