MANILA, Jan 28 (Reuters) - The Philippine army will struggle to defeat communist rebels and Islamic militants unless it curbs corruption and ensures that troops do not violate human rights, an administration lawmaker said on Monday.
Security forces have set themselves a mid-2010 deadline to wipe out the Maoist-led New People's Army (NPA) guerrillas and the Abu Sayyaf, a small Islamic military group with ties to al Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiah.
"Our military suffers a very serious credibility problem," Ruffy Biazon, vice-chairman of the House of Representatives panel on national defence, told Reuters in an interview.
"It has been distracting soldiers from carrying out their missions. The issues of corruption and rights abuses are too heavy a burden on their shoulders."
Since the late 1960s, the Philippines has been fighting two internal battles -- against communist rebels seeking to topple the central government in Manila and Muslim separatists aspiring to set up an independent Islamic state in the south.
The two conflicts have killed more than 160,000 people and stunted economic growth in one of the most resource-rich states in Southeast Asia, driving potential investors and tourists to its much more stable neighbours, such as Singapore and Malaysia.
"BODY COUNT"
As part of the security drive, military chief General Hermogenes Esperon has said he wants to dismantle 15 NPA rebel bases within the next three months, the amount of time his tenure in office has been extended by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
But Biazon said such a campaign "will not a result in a victory for us, it will only increase body count".
Local rights groups have accused soldiers of waging a "dirty war" against activists, holding them responsible for about 1,000 extrajudicial killings and disappearances since 2001.
The army denies the executions were official policy and has blamed rogue soldiers and internal purges within the NPA rebels.
Biazon also criticised the military for its failure to end graft after tenders for six attack helicopters were stopped last week over allegations of irregularities in the bidding procedures.
"Corruption remains in the senior ranks," he said, adding it was an issue that provoked younger army officers to plot against the government.
Biazon said he favoured allocating more funds to the military to modernise its equipment, such as aircraft, warships and trucks. Much of the equipment is obsolete and was left by the United States after the Vietnam War in the 1960s-70s.
"Our military needed more funds not just to allow them to fight our internal security threats, but guard our vast borders against illegal fishing, poaching and smuggling activities," he said.
On Monday, a bicameral panel of the Senate and the House of Representatives was due to approve the government's 1.2 trillion pesos budget for 2008.
"But, the bigger battles would be within its ranks -- reducing graft and putting forward a more friendly face to the people," Biazon said. (Reporting by Manny Mogato, editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Katie Nguyen)
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