CPP-NPA-NDF's RECRUITMENT OF STUDENTS- PROVEN BEYOND REASONABLE DOUBT

Agnes Lopez Reano

 

 

     

     At long last I am vindicated and exonerated. . . for almost fifteen (15) years, since I surrendered in 1993, most of the civilians that I met brazenly branded me as the “boy who cried wolf.”  They never believed that students who are recruited by the NPA left the four corners of an academic institution to join the bloody revolution, that student organizations are avenues and instruments of NPA recruitment, that these leftist front organizations are all bogus, that these people we see on the streets shouting and hiding on the cloak of patriotism and nationalism are charlatans, that activist if not properly guided becomes “red fighters”.

 

            My gratitude and indebtedness to two very plucky and responsible journalists MS JOCELYN R UY and MR NIKKO DIZON, both writers for the PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER, a paper that epitomizes its slogan “BALANCED NEWS, FEARLESS VIEWS”.

 

            To all the people out there, who will spare a minute of their time to read this story, let me share with you not only my life as a former NPA amazon, but the lives of countless young students I recruited, and many more that were recruited even after I surrendered. Those innocent lives that the CPP-NPA-NDF destroyed, those bubbly and vibrant youths with big dreams who only wanted to “become a part of the change” but were the ones drastically changed by the Godless ideologies and theories that we learned and studied in the mountains.

 

            This was not an easy story to write.  It brought out good emotions, searing and painful emotions, and a great struggle to understand the complexities of “TRUTH.” This story only reinforced my belief that there is no higher calling for a journalist than the “honest pursuit of the truth”, for in reality I am also a journalist by profession. This is not only the story of former students turned dyed-in-the-wool freedom fighters, but my  own special way of paying homage to the MS JOCELYN UY and MR NIKKO DIZON, who bravely and without prejudiced finally put into print the “war that is happening inside all the campuses” not only in Metro Manila but all over the country. The story that you will read gives credence to the articles that they wrote in PDI dated Dec. 27, 2008.

 

            Let me start my story and the stories of other countless students . . . .

 

            Ka Jady . . . he was only 16 years old, a fourth year high school student when he was recruited by the League of Filipino Student (LFS). In college he was a very talented mechanical engineering student of the University of Nueva Caceres (UNC), one of the Dean’s Listers. He was the “nerd” of our group, who looked like one of the Chemistry professor in the movie “Back to the Future”. He was the “serious” one, who looks at things in a different perspective and angle, one who always thought that the world is one big diorama of battlefield that needs to be analyzed and closely studied. A very soft-spoken cadre in front of those prospective students and mass bases but a fierce, ferocious and intense fighter during encounters, and the one we called “the gentle knight of progressive ideas.” One who dreamt that one day the revolution will reach its finality and will eventually benefits the Filipino people. . . but sad to say Ka Jady died not knowing that he was a part of the wide spectrum of communist deceptions and without achieving his dream. He died in an encounter in the hinterlands of Sorsogon after a teach-in.

 

            Ka Ryan . . . he was 17 years old when recruited by KM (Kabataang Makabayan) an engineering student who was sometimes lackadaisical but a very focused political instructor a GP or Giyang Pampolitika for the Abe Squad. He was the even-tempered cadre who will exert too much effort for a potential recruit to understand that only through “revolution” that the ills of society can be cured.  Despite his blasé character he firmly believed that students must take up arms to liberate the country and our people from the clutches of compradors and elites or the PML (Panginoong May Lupa).  Coming from a poor farmer’s family from Iriga, with a brood of seven (7) Ka Ryan experienced how it was to go school without eating his breakfast and only ten pesos in his pocket, of having only one pair of shoe to withstand the whole school year, and to walk the 5 kilometers distance from his home to school. Who was able to go to college because of a scholarship and educational grant. A supposed to be another promising engineer, but sad to say. . .  Ka Ryan died again in an encounter.  Another cadre who was not able to achieved his dream, dying for an obsolete cause . . . and laid somewhere in the boondocks of Albay, with not even a tomb stone to mark his grave.

 

Ka Sally . . . 16 years old when recruited by LFS, a Political Science major from one of the exclusive girl’s school in Naga.  Petite, tall, with pitch long black hair and with a face, so to say, “that will launch a thousand ships”. Another passionate political cadre, who will always reminds us of our credo “simpleng pamumuhay, masigabong pakikibaka”. The “nurturer” in our group, one who will always talk of the Filipino youth with so much fervor and who always believes in the resiliency of the Filipinos. A former catechist who will go out of her way to solicit school supplies for our elementary students in one of the public schools in the town of Magarao, Cam. Sur. Another student turned NPA who met the same fate. . . she died in an encounter in Castilla, Sorsogon. Her cadaver was left behind somewhere in Castilla when the attacking force retreated. . . another youth who believed that what she was doing was for the Filipino people.

 

Ka Max. . . was only 14 years old when he was recruited by Ka Sally. He was the Chairman of KADENA (Kabataan para sa Demokrasya at Nasyonalismo) of Brgy Sogod, Malinao, Albay. The maverick of the group, he was exceedingly gracious and generous in his personal dealings with his fellow cadres and red fighters and especially with our mass bases, but when it came to tough political decisions he typically ran right over friends and allies, he never hesitated in cutting loose anyone who became a political liability.  He was studying and taking up BSEEd at the Aquinas University when he finally decided to join the armed struggle.  He firmly believed then that the “highest form” of expressing love of country was through “bloody revolution” and eventually dying for his beloved country, unfortunately, Ka Max met the same fate as Ka Jady, Ka Ryan and Ka Max, he died in an encounter in Catanduanes sometime in 1989. Another wasted life of a budding and gifted youth . . .

 

           Ka Warly . . . another dean’s lister at the Bicol State University and taking up BS Chemistry, he was recruited by the LFS when he was only a freshman college at the age of 17           .  His sense of loyalty to the movement was so strong that his seriousness sometimes caused some friction among our group.  Ka Warly was a young, dynamic political cadre with a mercurial personality.  He was tall, thick, powerfully built despite his age at that time, like a bruising fullback, but he walked with the grace and agility of a dancer. He can be compassionate and generous with our civilian allies but during encounters he was a skilled, cold and uncaring red warrior. I considered him my fiery iconoclast mentor, his lectures and teach-ins were almost always riveting and mesmerizing, that there was never a single time that we will leave a place, school or barangay empty handed, we will surely have one, two or more recruits. I had good and fond memories of Ka Warly, he was like an older brother to me, a very protective and disciplinarian comrade, through him I learned to be tough and callous. He left a very distinct mark in my revolutionary life, he saved my life during one of our encounters sometimes in 1988 in Barcelona, Sorsogon. Again he met the same tragic death of a bewildered and star struck youngster; he died in an ambush in Matnog, Sorsogon.

           Ka Chay. . . 21 years old, a medical student from one of the prestigious medical universities in Metro Manila.  I was the one who recruited and even sponsored her when she finally decided to become a Fulltime member of the NPA in Bicol.  I met Ka Chay in one of our rallies during 1985, she was the team leader of her school’s contingent who were all members of the LFS.  We had been together in almost all of the rallies staged to push Marcos to step down from Malacanang. We developed and established a very candid relationship, Ka Chay practically bared herself to me, her secrets, aspirations, hang-ups, fears and family problems and I will tell her stories of our lives in the mountain, how we lived, worked and studied within the midst of our mass bases, how I was recruited, and the reasons why I joined the NPA. She became our Medical Officer, she learned by heart the art of acupuncture and became adept with it. Again another life lost in a war that will never see the light of day, supposed to become a promising doctor but was grabbed by the deceptions and ruses of the communist front organizations.  Ka Chay joined us in Bicol in July 1989 and was killed January 1990 in an encounter in Pilar, Sorsogon.

 

           Ka Melay . . . 17 years old, another honor student from UP Los Banos, she hailed from San Lorenzo Ruiz, Camarines Norte, and belong to one of the landed families in her town, her father was one of the biggest landowner while her mother also comes from a well-to-do family..  Not a single soul mistook Ka Melay as an NPA, she looked like a lost child, with a face of pure and honest innocence. But that innocence was lost in the mountain, as the Finance Secretary of our unit, she became a calculating and cunning structured logical decision maker.  I can still vividly remember a particular encounter which happened in Prieto Diaz, Sorsogon, she was leading a team of 15 NPA fighters while I had with me one squad.  We both had just finished a pulong-pulong in one of the barangays in the said town, on our way back to our temporary base, we met a platoon of soldiers, and as expected, an encounter happened.  I saw a different Ka Melay from a timid and introvert youth she drastically became a fiery team leader, shouting commands with an M16 bursting with fire.  I saw a very idealistic youth willing to die for her country . . . and died she did . . . she was leading a team of one squad in Irosin, Sorsogon when again her unit crossed path with a team of soldiers, expectedly another firefight ensued . . . after the smoke of gunfire Ka Melay and three of her men were lying in the pool of their own blood with their backpacks scattered around them.  Another youthful soul sacrificed by the CPP-NPA-NDF for their own vested and twisted self-interest.

 

           Ka Jady, Ka Ryan, Ka Sally, Ka Max, Ka Warly, Ka Chay and Ka Melay, they were all my comrades in the mountains, we were together for better and for worst, during tough times and light moments, times when we don’t have anything to eat, those trying times that we doubted one another because of the internal purges. They all died for naught, all wasted lives, lives that were sacrificed and was fed in the lion’s den.  Add up to these names, are hundreds of youths who were lured but later realized they were fighting a nonsensical war, the likes of the Gumanoy sisters, Salve, Lenelyn, Andrew, Bunso, Bryan, Rolly, Nato, Jed, Lea, Jack, Ernie, Edgar, and others who are now picking up the pieces of their lives and trying to mend their broken spirits.  The students who are now in their clutches and operating in Metro Manila like Ayra, Patring, Lukan, Jasmine, AJ, Divs, Henry, John Michael, Alain Mark Zamora, Jaime Baliza, Vencer Crisostomo, Yuka Crain, Nonem, Allan, Dean, Ronald, Liya, Kristin Callido, Marissa Espedido, Jerome, Aaron, Howell, Rene Boy, Donna Pascual and thousands more who claims to be “mulat” or “Open minded” but still blinded by the false promises of these charlatans, students who are recruited and are still being recruited inside the confines of an academic institution not only here in Metro Manila but nationwide who eventually go up to the mountains.

 

           The tragic stories above of my former comrades are only some of the wasted lives sacrificed by Jose Maria Sison’s communist movement, those sacred lives of youthful exuberance and hope, deceived and lured by the communist front organizations.  And to clearly convey to you, dear readers, of what we experienced, how we feel, the nerve-racking fears, the apprehensions, the anxiety whenever we had an encounter, let me quote the former US Senator John Robert Kerry, a Medal of Valor awardee and a Vietnam War veteran, from one of his essay entitled “On Remembering the Vietnam War”.  This searing piece markedly manifest our experiences in the mountains during gun battle and what I feel and surely what others like me are undergoing and experiencing right now:

 

“Around the farm, there is an activity that no one likes to do. 
Yet it is sometimes necessary.  When a cat gives birth to kittens that aren’t needed, the kittens must be destroyed.  And there is a moment when you are holding the kitten under the water when you know that if you bring the kitten back above the water it will live, and if you don’t bring it back above in that instant the kitten will be dead.  This, for me, is a perfect metaphor for those dreadful moments in war when you do not quite do what you previously thought you would do.  I do not choose to recount such moments, because I find myself unable and unwilling.  However, this is an experience that is not mine alone, but is faced by everyone, whether in war or in peace time: one has a moment in which one makes a decision, and afterwards one feels as if one has fallen from grace.  One receives not only one’s own judgment, but the judgment of other human beings, and in the end, the judgment of Almighty God.”

 

           I come away feeling fortunate to have survived, painfully aware that dead men tell no tales.  The movement’s waging of bloody revolution was a colossal mistake, how it led the nation and the Filipino people down a path of lies. I’m sure none of us who were recruited could come up with an answer why it happened, how it happened, and how we let it happened.  Surely all of us are undergoing a tormented soul-searching, carrying our guilt quietly, but trying very hard to go about our daily business, mending our broken spirits, and trying to live a normal life.

 

            To MS JOCELYN R. UY and MR NIKKO DIZON . . .my kudos and salute. . . thank you for becoming the Rebel Returnees’ “VOICE” that our experiences may be known to all.  MARAMING SALAMAT PO AT MABUHAY KAYO.

My deep and lasting GRATITUDE goes also to the AFP Officers who are always there to help and willing to pick us up whenever we backslide, notable to  mention are the following: To my Commanding Officer COL BUENAVENTURA C PASCUAL who is always there to understand and support me and some of my alaga, and who believes that I can still be a part of the positive change.  To COL RICARDO VISAYA, who is like a brother to me and who is always willing to lend an understanding ear, who patiently explains the military world and guided me through thick and thin.  To CAPT RENE G OGUES, a brother, a friend, my intellectual opponent and protector; to MAJ GERARDO ZAMUDIO who believes that my voice in my program “Kontra Pula” will enlightened students and will give them the alternative action to undertake in their aspirations for change; to my Group Commander at the Philippine Army Civil Military Operations Group COL DANIEL LUCERO; other AFP officers, my dearest and tested friends who always stand by me, the Officers and men of the CMO Battalion, the soldiers who are willing to lay down their lives for my security and safety, to the Rebel Returnees who are with me in this crusade; and to my Family ESPECIALLY TO MY CHILDREN, THANK YOU FOR YOUR UNDERSTANDING AND SUPPORT. . . saying “thank you” is not enough. . . SA INYONG LAHAT ANG AKING PAGPUPUGAY AT TAOS PUSONG PASASALAMAT.

 

           At last, the CPP-NPA-NDF recruitment of students and youths . . . has come out into the open and has been PROVEN BEYOND REASONABLE DOUBT. . . . . . .