Rebels hail fallen comrades

By Dolly Yasa

BACOLOD City – The New People’s Army hailed five of their comrades slain in an encounter with government forces Thursday.

In a statement issued on Friday, Ka Juanito Magbanua, spokesperson of the Apolinario Gatmaitan Command, said “The New People’s Army-Apolinario Gatmaitan Command firmly salutes with the highest revolutionary fervor Ka Dennis, Ka Leo, Ka Joy, Ka Jabar, and Ka Raymond for their dauntless sacrifice.”

Magbanua said that the 5-man team was raided by combined elements of the 11th IB, 94th IB, and the Regional Mobile Force Battalion with almost 100 personnel in a household at Sitio Talingting, Barangay Luyang, Mabinay, Negros Oriental on June 18 at around 1 a.m.

He further said that “their valiant deed will resound and will serve as further inspiration for the masses and the comrades to wage ceaselessly and tirelessly the national democratic revolution to greater heights until victory.”

“It is normal for a revolution to be bloody; the New People’s Army is fearless in facing sacrifice even at the risk of their own lives, as that pain is a thousand times more worth it than apathetically enduring the pain in this semi-colonial and semi-feudal country,” Magbanua added.

He also said that “as Chairman Mao Zedong puts it, their deaths are as heavy as of the tallest of mountains as their blood will trickle down the grassroots and blossom into thousands more of red fighters.”

Magbanua also said that the AFP-PNP “will misnomer this as their victory and hard-headedly insist that the revolution is weakening.”

But he said that “the just revolutionary war led by the Communist Party of the Philippines will only gain more ground as Duterte and his tyranny has recruited the broadest united front against state terrorism. They themselves are the number 1 recruiter for the NPA.”

“What the ruling class has failed to understand is that the 51 years of the revolution is not an effort of a few people but by the millions that they force to revolt because of exploitation most evident in the rural peasantry,” he added.

Magbanua also said that “the breeding ground of the people’s war is the chronic illness brought about by imperialism, local feudalism and bureaucrat capitalism. Injustice begets resistance; and the worsening greed of will only dig its own grave as the people’s army will undoubtedly flourish.”

Earlier, Army Capt. Cenon Panchito III 3rd Infantry Division spokesman said that five suspected members of the New People’s Army (NPA) were killed in a clash at Sitio Talingting, Brgy Luyang, Mabinay, Negros Oriental early Thursday.

One of the fatalities was wanted for violation of Republic Act 10591 or the Comprehensive Firearms and Ammunition Law and for the ambush-slay of four policemen in Ayungon town last year.