Vol. VII, No. 22 - November 30, 2025
The crisis of the semicolonial and semifeudal ruling system is quickly reaching a breaking point. As contradictions among the reactionary factions sharpen, both the Marcos clique and the Duterte camp now find themselves increasingly cornered, isolated, and exposed before the Filipino people and the world.
The exposé by Zaldy Co only affirms what the masses have long known: that Marcos Jr directly benefited from congressional insertions tied to corruption-ridden infrastructure projects. This regime, already notorious for its utter incompetence and flagrant extravagance, is once again unmasked as a machinery of plunder. Marcos Jr has grown desperate to secure the favor of his imperialist masters.
To keep himself afloat, Marcos Jr has surrendered national sovereignty piece by piece by signing one military agreement after another. The most recent Status of Visiting Forces Agreement with Canada and the formation of the US “Task Force Philippines” represent nothing less than the wholesale subordination of the country to US military control. In exchange for US protection and patronage, Marcos Jr has transformed the archipelago into a forward base of US imperialist war, placing the Filipino people directly in harm’s way as the US continues to provoke China into an impending war.
The incompetence of the Marcos Jr regime is equally exposed by the devastation caused by consecutive typhoons and earthquakes in recent months. Relief has been slow, insufficient, or altogether absent forcing ordinary Filipinos to fend for themselves while officials pose for cameras and trade accusations on national media. This deliberate abandonment of disaster-stricken communities exposes the Marcos Jr regime as utterly detached from the people and deepening in its isolation from the masses.
Meanwhile, the Dutertes are scrambling to exploit the chaos and regain lost ground. They rally their own political machinery, hoping that the people can again be fooled, but they badly miscalculate. Rodrigo Duterte remains detained despite the sham theatrics portraying him as a frail old man, a ploy meant to manufacture sympathy and obscure accountability. At the same time, the Dutertes are far from exempt in the unfolding corruption scandals. The stench of their thievery has likewise been exposed in the anomalous flood-control projects in Davao City under Paolo Duterte’s term as mayor between 2020 to 2022, revealing how deeply they, too, have dipped their hands into public coffers. With an ICC arrest warrant closing in on Bato dela Rosa and former allies breaking ranks, the Duterte camp is rapidly sinking into isolation.
But the Filipino people are not condemned to choose merely between factions of their oppressors. The deepening crisis of the semicolonial and semifeudal system only underscores that no faction of the ruling class can or will resolve the suffering of the people. The moment demands the necessity of waging the national democratic revolution, dismantling the machinery of the reactionary state, and establishing a people’s democratic government.
As conditions worsen amid spiraling poverty, landlessness, government neglect during times of disasters, the massive theft of public funds, and growing repression, more and more Filipinos are choosing the path of armed resistance. As the legal democratic mass movement surges, so too must the strength of the underground revolutionary forces. The New People’s Army must continue building widespread mass bases in the countryside, carrying out agrarian revolution, fighting for land, and dismantling the landlords’ stranglehold over the countryside. The only genuine path out of this political circus and the end of bureaucrat capitalism, is the advance and eventual victory of the national democratic revolution with a socialist perspective.