Visible failure of intelligence

DEFENSE Secretary Delfin Lorenzana wants us to believe that the reason he unilaterally revoked the agreement between the University of the Philippines (UP) and his department is that he wants to protect UP students from the threat of communism. He is channeling the dominant narrative being peddled by many diehard Duterte supporters (DDS) that UP is a breeding ground for communism. They accuse UP of enabling the agents of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) and not just students and faculty but even outsiders to openly recruit members.

One is tempted to openly challenge this reasoning for the simple reason that it reeks of deficient logic. This is not to say that there is no recruitment happening inside the UP campuses. After all, it is a university where recruitment is done by people coming from different ideological persuasions, from the conservative evangelical Christians to those involved in pyramiding schemes, and, admittedly, even the CPP-NPA. As an alumnus of UP, I was recruited by fraternities, born-again Christian groups, regional groups and socio-civic, cause-oriented organizations. Frankly, I have never been recruited to join the CPP-NPA even if I knew of some people who really joined the movement.