Michelle B.

Celebrado Professor Marikit Uychoco English 10 20 March 2014

Terrorism: A Problem in the Philippines Bomb attacks, kidnappings and murders. These are the
words that comes to our mind when we hear the word terrorism. Terrorism is an already known
problem in our country, for it brings every day horror to the people living in the area, and it really
affects not only the people, but also the country as a whole. The government actually did so
many actions just to protect the people from being harmed by the terrorists. But the question is,
are government
s action
s in resolving the issues on terrorism in the country, particularly in Mindanao area, enough to
keep peace? Terrorism was defined as:

Criminal acts intended or calculated to provoke a state of terror in the general public, a group of
persons or particular persons for political purposes are in any circumstance unjustifiable,
whatever the considerations of a political, philosophical, ideological, racial, ethnic, religious or any
other nature that may be invoked to justify them

(United Nations General Assembly). The Philippines is used as a home for many terrorism-
related activities that are conducted by Islamic terrorist groups, particularly in the southern area
even before the 9/11 attack. According to Preeti Bhattacharji, from Council on Foreign
Relations, these terrorist activities are being linked to a number of militant groups such as
The Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG), The Communist
Party of the Philippines (or New Peoples Army), Jemaah Islamiyah, Alex Boncayao Brigade,
Pentagon Gang, Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), and
currently the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF). These groups have conducted many
attacks within the Philippines for almost three decades which have killed hundreds of people, and
most of them were civilians.

2
Terrorist organizations that are active in the Philippines are the Abu Sayyaf Group, New
Peoples Army and Jemaah Islamiy
ah. But after the 2007 report from the Congressional Research Service, two more militant groups
are being monitored later on: the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the Moro National
Liberation Front (MNLF). The Archive Web site of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) said that Abu
Sayyaf, which means
Bearer of the Sword
in Arabic, is the most active and the most ferocious Islamic militant group in the Southern
Philippines that occurred in 1991 as a separate group of the MNLF
(Philippines and Terrorism)
. The group was also involved in many issues of kidnappings (kidnap-for-ransom), bombings,
robbery, piracy, assassinations and extortion.
Another group is the New Peoples Army
(NPA), a military extension of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). It was founded by
Jose Maria Sison in 1969 with an aim of ousting the Philippine government through guerrilla
warfare and was against the U.S. military manifestation in the Philippines
(Philippines and Terrorism)

Maybe you

re wondering why there are so many terrorist groups in the Philippines and some are still active.
This is because each of these terrorist groups in the Philippines has different purposes and
reasons in doing such petrifying activities. The reason being heard of is about creating their own
Islamic State in the Southern Philippines. Other reasons include the Islamic minority resentment,
enduring poverty, and to weak government control in the area (U.S. State Department).
According to Estrella Torres, reporter from
BusinessMirror.com,
other information said that these rebels carried out bomb attacks against the ruling
government, public and private facilities in Central and Western areas of Mindanao, and other
operations in the country. But the most alarming is that they do terrible activities such as
kidnapping or kidnap-for-ransom, bomb-for-hire, bomb-for-sale and extortion just to make
revenue for self-sustainment and to ensure protection of their families by just obeying their
bosses. Aside from the reasons being stated, is issue in religion a factor that contributes to
terrorism

Governments actions include the implementation of security forces to form task groups that will
secure areas with threats in Mindanao, or the so-
called hotspots and danger zones.
The secured environment was intended for the protection of many Filipinos and Foreigners.
Other actions of the government involved the tightened security, police visibility in the area,
intelligence operatives, warnings, direct sharing of information among responsible agencies for
immediate actions and heightened alert levels in Mindanao areas and other cases.

On the whole, the Philippine government has already implemented so many actions and
solutions just to maintain peace and order in the country. However, in spite of all the things the
government did just to secure public safety, these actions were still not enough. That is why the
Philippine government should think of new ways on how to improve security forces and how to
improve Mindanao areas that were affected by terrorism in particular. Essentially, the problems
were not with the implemented actions of the government (or how bad or well the actions are) in
resolving the issues of terrorism. This is because the real problems came from the person and
how he/she handles the situation.