It's the cold hard truth.
The local communist group has been engaged in tax collection from "everybody" that only made its leaders richer, President Duterte bared Tuesday, June 8.
The President slammed the rebel group for the extortion of local businesses, saying its leaders have become "millionaires, billionaires" due to this illegal activity while members remained poor.
"Alam mo the real hard reality is this: ang NPA, Pastor, is collecting taxes from everybody," Duterte said during a television interview by religious leader Apollo Quiboloy Tuesday, June 8.
"Huwag ko na lang pangalanan be it a big construction company, road building company o mga infrastructures diyan, mga eskuwelahan, buildings and everything, pati ‘yong mga tindahan, ‘yong malalaking tindahan sa Maynila --- ayaw ko na lang sabihin mayroon ditong branch kung saan-saan --- nagbabayad ‘yan kaya maraming pera ang Politburo (I won't name them be it a big construction company, road building company o infrastructure, schools, buildings, and everything, stores, the huge stores in Manila, I won't say which branch but they paying so the Politburo has lots of money)," he added.
Duterte said rebel leaders were living in affluence, even sending their kids to school abroad, while their members continued to live in poverty and hunger.
"Puro mayaman, sa karamihan sa kanila wala dito nasa Amerika, nasa Europe (They are all rich, most of them are living in America and Europe) and they are being sustained by the taxation collected by these poor people," he said.
Dismayed by rebel extortion and other atrocities, the President said the government would continue to combat insurgency and terrorism in a bid to attain lasting peace in the country. He said government's security forces have so captured thousands of lawless elements substantially decreasing the strength of those terrorists.
"We acknowledge that terrorism and insurgency are problems that have plagued our country for so long. This is why we launched a multi-sectoral approach to address this problem," he said.
"I am, thus, very grateful to our government forces in making it possible for us to sustain the momentum of the whole-of-the-nation approach to end the insurgency and terrorism," he added.
The government will also sustain the socio-economic development mechanism that will address the root cause of the peace and order problem, he said.
"We need to win the hearts and minds of our people so that they would not be easily fall prey to the manipulative skills of these insurgents and extremist groups," he said.
Peace talks between the government and the rebels collapsed in 2017 after the President protested the atrocities committed by the rebels against security forces and civilians. Duterte recently said no peace talks would succeed during his term if the rebels would not stop their attacks and other unlawful activities.