• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
One of the six New People’s Army rebels killed in a Bohol encounter on September 7, used to be assigned in Negros Oriental and faces rebellion charges, revealed yesterday by Lt. Col. J Jay Javines, chief of the Army 3rd Infantry Division Civil Military Operations.
Javines disclosed that Ruben Nabas, with aliases of Bogs, Ebyong, Elmer, Padi, and Rex, was the former vice commander of the NPA elite force in southern Negros Oriental, and former leader of the Special Armed Partisan Unit (SPARU) of the NPA in central Visayas.
Nabas was also the suspect and believed to be the triggerman in the killing of Chief Inspector Pelecio Domino, the police chief of Talibon in Bohol, on June 26, 2010, he added.
Military records further showed that Nabas was among those who participated in the attack of two police camps in Bohol in 1999, the bombing of two newly constructed transmission towers of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines in Sagbayan and San Miguel, both in Bohol, in 2011 and 2012, respectively.
Javines also reported that, Jingler Compoc, son of Domingo Compoc alias Eloy, the Secretary of BPPC, KR-NCBS, and Nelson Lumantas, secretary-general of the Hugpong sa Mag-uumang Bol-anon (HUMABOL), the Provincial Affiliate of the CPP-led Kilusang Magbubukid sa Pilipinas (KMP), were also killed in Bilar encounter, together with Nabas.
The elder Compoc and several other NPA cadres from Negros Oriental were dispatched to Bohol several years ago, to reorganize the dismantled Bohol Party Committee, military records further showed.
Javines also revealed that Lumantas together with Joemar Pogio; Ira Pamat, executive director of the Women Development Center; Raquel Autida of GABRIELA Bohol; farmers Brando Compoc and Alfie Sarsale; and 31 others were accused of murder and frustrated murder for the death of PFC Gerald Villanueva during an encounter between the 47th Infantry Battalion and the NPA on February 29, 2020 in the mountains of Barangay Cansumbol, Bilar, Bohol.
“On the hindsight, this incident is but another proof of the duplicity and strategy of the CPP-NPA-NDF. This is but another proof why the CPP, its legal fronts and other allied groups could not openly and publicly condemn nor denounce the atrocities of the NPA,” Javines said.
“It is mainly because – they are only one and the same. They are of the same mold and cut in the same vein. On the other hand, background check conducted on Nabas revealed that he has a string of criminal cases, including several multiple murder, attempted murder and attempted homicide cases, filed against him and his companions at the Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 51 and in the Provincial Prosecutor Office of Bohol,” he added.
The story of Nabas is a typical story among most of the NPAs that came before him and those that still remain in the organization. For almost three decades in the armed movement, he has lived a life that is full of deceit, notoriety and criminality, Javines pointed out.*
