Sonny Melencio

US China Asia Pacific

Filipino socialist activist and Party of the Labouring Masses (PLM) chairperson Sonny Melencio speaks with Federico Fuentes about global imperialism and the Filipino left’s response to the threat of a US-China war.

The decision to field presidential and vice-presidential candidates represents a bold — and unprecedented — move for the Philippines left. Sonny Melencio explains why the Partido Lakas ng Masa has taken this step.

Members of the “dynasty triad”, from left: Bongbong Marcos, Sara Duterte and Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

Three of the country’s most powerful political dynasties – the Marcoses, Arroyos and Dutertes – have entered into an unholy alliance with the hope of consolidating power in 2022 and beyond, writes Sonny Melencio.

When I was travelling from Manila to Australia, I bought a copy of a book to read on the plane. It was Dan Brown’s novel Inferno. Actually, when this book first hit the bookshops, the Philippines went crazy about a small part of the novel that referred to Manila as the “gate of hell”.
The petition for certification of Party of the Labouring Masses (PLM) as a national political party was approved by the Commission on Elections in September. With this approval, the fight for a national political party representing the marginalised sectors has escalated to new heights. This is a confirmation of the PLM’s three-and-a-half years of existence and its expansion as a political party with a mass constituency and grassroots chapter-formations.