Tiamzons were overseeing rehab work in Yolanda areas

MANILA, Philippines – Alleged Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) chairman Benito Tiamzon and his wife Wilma Austria were looking into the conditions of the victims of Super Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) at the time of their arrest, according to the CPP in a statement posted on its website on Sunday, March 23. 

“At the time of their arrest, both Tiamzon and Austria were performing tasks and duties assigned to them by the CPP and the NDFP. Up to recently, both were busy conducting first hand investigation into the conditions of the working class people in the Visayas region whose lives were devastated by supertyphoon Yolanda (Haiyan),” the statement said. 

“Despite their age and health conditions, both Tiamzon and Austria continue to travel great distances in the rural areas in order to reach the farthest peasant homes and be among the most downtrodden masses. Unlike Aquino who was totally clueless of the conditions of the people in the path of supertyphoon Yolanda, Tiamzon and Austria were among the peasant masses when the winds ravaged through the Visayas,” the statement added.

Before the couple’s arrest in Cebu on Saturday, March 22, the military said they were were being monitored in Samar, one of the provinces hardest hit by Yolanda, the most powerful typhoon ever recorded. Tiamzon was a senior party official in the Eastern Visayas before he assumed the party’s top post, according to government intelligence. (READ: Benito Tiamzon: Writer, organizer, party man)

The CPP maintained that Tiamzon and Austria have immunity from arrest under the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG) because both are consultants of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines, the CPP’s political wing that is negotiating a peace deal with the government. 

“The NDFP has further identified both Tiamzon and Austria as holders of documents of identification counter-verified by then officials of the GPH,” the CPP said.

Government chief negotiatior Alex Padilla said the verification process failed, however. The NDF supposedly failed to submit the data file that would list the aliases and attach photos of “underground” personalities covered by JASIG. (READ: CPP chief, wife not covered by immunity)

Reds’ relief efforts

The CPP in December 2013 declared it was abandoning peace talks with the Aquino government but the movement never formalized this.

After the Tiamzons’ arrest, the party stepped up its criticism of President Benigno Aquino III, blaming the continued suffering of Yolanda victims on “the Aquino regime’s antipeople, crony-controlled, corrupt, and grossly inept response to the calamity.”

The CPP paints Tiamzon and Austria as the “opposite of the landlord Aquino and his coterie of corrupt officials.”

“Tiamzon and Austria are the epitome of simple living. Neither of them own a private home nor drive their own sportscar. Neither do they play with guns for fun or personal satisfaction,” the statement said.

“They were receiving reports from NPA commands about efforts to mobilize Red fighters to help build communal farms, till the land and mobilize and distribute seeds and other agricultural resources from the NDFP.”

Tiamzon “was personally looking into studies estimating the actual damage on agriculture and fisheries to be at P75-80 billion, contrary to the Aquino regime’s grossly understated estimate of P15 billion which helps justify the allocation of bigger funds to his crony’s big business infrastructure projects,” the CPP statement said.

Yolanda killed at least 6,000 people and left about 4 million homeless. – Rappler.com