• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
The Apolinario Gatmaitan Command of the New People’s Army dismissed military claims that it may defeat the NPA in Negros by year end.
In a statement, rebel spokesman Ka Maoche Legislador claimed that AFP chief of staff Gen. Andres Centino is having “doom with illusions” on possibly defeating the Negros NPA by the end of 2023, by insisting that guerrilla fronts in Negros are either dismantled or weakened.
In his recent visit to various Army units of 3rd Infantry Division in Negros Island, Centino said raised the possibility that 3ID may able to finish the insurgency in Negros by end of the year, following a series of debacles suffered by the NPA, through focused military operations and nontraditional military operations.
He rallied Army commanders to take advantage of the rebel leadership vacuum in Negros, the surrender and deaths of many combatants, leaders and mass-based supporters, by conducting focused military operations against the NPA “without let up.”
Legislador said that Centino is underestimating the people’s war waged on Negros Island.
He also stressed that the revolutionary movement led by the Communist Party of the Philippines has a plethora of Party cadres in every level, armed with Marxism-Leninism-Maoism ideals and tempered by struggle, who will succeed and continue the task of leading the revolution.
Legislador explained that the revolutionary movement is not based on a sole individual but on the conscious undertaking of the masses long exploited by centuries of injustice.
There can never really be a ‘vacuum’, but a long line of revolutionaries willing to fight for a just cause, he further stressed.
Among the top rebel leaders neutralized by the 303rd Infantry Brigade infantry units in Negros Island, were Rogelio Posadas, secretary of the Komiteng Rehiyonal Negros/ Cebu/Bohol/Siquijor, and its regional commander, Romeo Nanta, among other guerilla front secretaries.
The remaining Central Negros 1 and 2, as well as the South West Front have been categorized by the Armed Forces of the Philippines as “weakened,” and the South East and Northern Negros Fronts categorized as “dismantled.”*
