The following is a personal opinion piece from a Socialist Republican in Waterford.
17/12/2022, Port Láirge.
“There is the hero who dies in the battlefield,
There is the hero who dies of hunger or disease,
There is the hero who dies of some accident,
There is the hero who dies of old age
Whatever the manner of death,
There is a common denominator,
A hero serves the people,
To his very last breath.”
Socialist Republicans in Ireland should extend their heartfelt sympathies and condolences to the family and comrades of Prof. Jose Maria Canlas Sison, also known endearingly among the anti-imperialists of the Philippines as “Ka Joma” and “Tito Jo”. During this difficult day, we must recognise the heavy loss that the Filipino national democratic revolutionaries are bearing. To the recently departed Jose Maria Sison and our Filipino comrades who are preparing to carry on his life’s work, we should express our utmost solidarity, respect, and admiration. Ka Joma was, and still remains, an example to Socialist Republicans. His allies were the most upstanding of the ordinary Filipino people, his enemies were US-backed warlords such as the Marcoses and Duterte, who called on soldiers to “ignore human rights.”
A sycamore tree is survived by seeds which fly across the country, and even after his passing Sison’s legacy lasts and continues to grow across the Philippines, and in the hearts and minds of all those he has inspired around the world. In this time we must also remember and consider the pain of Prof. Sison’s fellow Filipino revolutionary, lifelong comrade, and spouse, Julie de Lima. We are grateful and proud that there are comrades such as de Lima in this world still working tirelessly to realise Sison’s noble dream of a liberated Philippines free of imperialism, environmental destruction, sweatshops, and the oppression of women, national minorities, and the LGBTQ community.
Everywhere in the world there sometimes arises an exceptional personality among activists. Among these people, revolutionaries, Jose Maria Sison sits at the seat of having achieved perhaps the highest level of personal devotion and achievement that their struggle has to offer. When struck and beaten with a stick, minds such as Sison’s differ from other activists who think “How can we convince them not to hit us?”, instead asking “If I grabbed the stick, how much force would I need to apply to break it? At what point does it snap?”. This was the approach Sison took to the oppression of the Philippines: analysis of its conditions, and the creation and, most importantly, selfless action towards a programme for the overthrow of its imperialist robbers.
Jose Maria Sison lead a remarkable life.
Born on the island of Luzon in 1939 and having lived through the dramatic occupation of the Philippines by the Japanese Empire, and its reconquest by US imperialism, Sison graduated from the University of the Philippines with a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature. An intelligent, energetic, and sharp learner, Sison learned several languages alongside his fluency in English and Filipino, including Indonesian. Sison would also go on to become an accomplished poet, later achieving the South East Asia WRITE award for his work. A university professor in literature and political sciences, Sison became aptly interested in the communist movement and the anti-imperialist struggle in the Philippines, a semi-feudal and semi-colonial island country in South East Asia which was, and still remains, dominated by an oppressive comprador regime subservient to Yankee imperialism.
With his studious mind and unending committment Sison understood the problems of the Philippines and imperialism’s hand in the misery of its people. He saw the suffering of the people toiling in great plantations for multinationals, and slaving away in sweatshops. As a patriot who loved his country and its people, he selflessly abandoned his comfortable and secure life for a world of struggle and hardship. Jose Maria Sison perfectly captured the best, most tyranny-hating and down-to-earth aspects of the Filipino people.
As a revolutionary he worked tirelessly to rejuvenate the ideologically stagnant and capitulated revolutionary movement in the Philippines in what became known as the First Great Rectification Movement, an event that lead to the re-founding of the Communist Party of the Philippines, and the creation of the New People’s Army, a guerrilla army whose fighting ranks currently lead one of the most advanced struggles for national liberation and socialism in the world today. Just as great national heroes such as Andrés Bonifacio and Crisanto Evangelista had done before him, Sison organised within and rallied the youth to bring the revolution forward. “Only through militant struggle can the best in the youth emerge”, he said.
Through the underground revolutionary youth organisation Kabataang Makabayan Sison waged a relentless struggle against corruption and revisionism in the Party, connecting with peasant’s organisations, trades unions, and veterans of the old Hukbalahap guerrillas. Jose Maria Sison was and remained till death a close and true student of legendary Chinese revolutionary Mao Zedong, having met him personally. Once the New People’s Army, Communist Party of the Philippines, and later the National Democratic Front of the Philippines, were established, Sison travelled dauntlessly across the Philippines, marching through jungle and mountains personally directing and advising the growing revolution he had been so crucial in sparking.
The brutal martial law imposed on the Philippines by the dictator Ferdinand Marcos was a terrified response by yankee imperialism and its servants, who feared the advance of Sison and the National Democratic revolution, who challenged their military hegemony in Asia and the free reign of their corporations to loot the country. Sison and his movement stood for everything despised by the powers that be: justice, sovereignty, and humanity.
The New People’s Army, growing through guerrilla warfare against the Armed Forces of the Philippines, fought and won several military victories against the yank imperialist army, connecting with other anti-imperialist struggles in Asia such as the war for national liberation in Vietnam and the Cultural Revolution in China.
Separated from Julie de Lima and the rest of his family, Sison was captured by the Marcos regime in 1977, enduring torture as a political prisoner for 9 long years. Despite the efforts of the fascists to parade, beat, tempt, and torment him for nearly a decade, Sison showed his steel by never relenting under the immense weight of his imprisonment. They did all in their power to break Sison’s heart and chain his free mind. He never gave a single name or drop of information to his captors. He dramatically never gave in even in a face-to-face confrontation with Marcos himself. Despite isolation and numerous forms of brutal torture, the starved, sick, and partially immobile Sison only selflessly directed his thoughts to the fate of his country. In his later poem “Fragments of a Nightmare” he recalled:
“But still my pain and suffering is small
As I think of those who suffer more
The violence of daily exploitation
And the rampage of terror on the land.
I belittle my pain and suffering
As I think of the people who fight
For their own redemption and freedom
And avenge the blood of martyrs.
I belittle my pain and suffering
As I hope to give more to the struggle.”
Once Sison was released after a brief reprise from the post-Marcos government of Cory Aquino, Sison and the National Democratic Front rejected calls to surrender from the new more acceptable face of imperialism in the Philippines, and continued to wage revolutionary struggle, and continue to do so, at a scale now far greater than their peak in the Marcos era. In 1988 Sison was exiled to the Netherlands, and forced to suffer the pain of a patriot separated from his homeland. During his life in the Netherlands, Sison, far from taking the easy road of slipping into revolutionary retirement, chose to work without rest for the liberation of the Philippines and world for the remainder of his life. Again, Sison could not be tempted by comfort or rest.
He served as a political consultant to the National Democratic Front, and as founding Chairperson and later Chairperson Emeritus of the International League for People’s Struggles. Through the ILPS he played a leading role in directing and spurring on the growth and development of the National Democratic Mass Organisations, or “NDMO’s” for short. Based in the Philippines and around the world, these organisations, which include trades unions, peasants’ organisations, indigenous rights activists, LGBTQ advocacy groups, migrants’ unions, lawyers’ associations, academic institutions, fishermens’ associations, youth and student groups, doctors’ and nurses’ unions, and so many more, all in their own respects rallying thousands of members and waging their own fierce struggles independently of the NDF. This progress in the building of mass organisations in an anti-imperialist movement is certainly an inspiration to Socialist Republicans.
Jose Maria Sison always stated his wish to “keep my mind sharp” during his exile. Sison always provided valuable insight on Filipino and world affairs through his lectures and writings, a service continued until but a couple of months ago, where Sison remained remarkably articulate, showing that the engine of his young revolutionary mind had never rusted. He always retained his jovial and infectious sense of humour and fun. He will surely be remembered for his refreshing playful side and glowing smile.
Sison’s sharpness of wit was also necessary for Sison’s own safety, as the EU and Yankee imperialists led constant legal offensives against Sison, attempting to strip him of human rights. Sison faced legal battle after legal battle over the “terrorism”, never being forgiven for how he stood up, and how his comrades continue to stand up, against the imperialist plunder of the EU and USA. He was imprisoned, he had his assets stolen or frozen, he was berated with unfair designations, and he was constantly threatened with being sent to the butcher regimes of the Philippines to die.
The successive fascistic regimes in the Philippines made constant attempts to assassinate Sison, sometimes through gunfire at his residence. But Sison remained undeterred, openly mocking such attempts and laughing at the pathetic lapdog governments attempting to kill him.
While his passing is a tragedy, it is an absolute undisputable victory for Sison that instead of being shot down by the government agents, he died at the old age of 83, surrounded by friends, family, and comrades, peacefully in his sleep, never having gone senile or capitulated but an inch of his revolutionary life and work. Julie de Lima and the rest of Sison’s close comrades can say that Sison lead a remarkable life that they can be forever proud of.
Socialist Republicans in Ireland have always stood with the Filipino revolution.
Remembering the days of the great Republican Ruairí Ó Brádaigh reaching out to the Filipino internationalists in the 1970’s, Socialist Republicans should recognise that Jose Maria Sison deserves the respect of Ireland and her struggle as a man who devoted life and limb, hurdling the most severe repression and ideological struggle, and as a patriot, internationalist, and devout Marxist-Leninist-Maoist revolutionary. We must mourn his passing and offer our condolences to the National Democratic Front, Communist Party of the Philippines, New People’s Army, and any independent NDMO’s which Sison worked together with in his arduous journey to build a nation worthy of the Filipino people.
Jose Maria Sison, the torchbearer of one of the most advanced living revolutions in the world today, and perhaps the greatest Filipino of the century, has now gone to join the honourable ranks of not just Filipino freedom fighters like Bonifacio, but also the ranks of revolutionaries across the world with great Irishmen such as Tone, Connolly, Mellows, and Costello, and surely, his mentor Mao Zedong. His life, the life of a legend, was living proof that revolution is not a remnant of the past but instead a key to a future, and Sison’s view of the future was full of joy and justice for the world. He, both an artist, academic, and fighter, truly lived up to the title of his iconic poem “The Guerrilla is Like a Poet”. I salute him for his service. In his memory we must pledge to work harder to express solidarity between the Irish and Filipino struggles for national liberation, especially now that his fight reaches new heights against Marcos’ son and successor. We should document and watch the challenges and victories of the People’s War in the Philippines attentively. We also join his family’s calls for his remains to be brought to his homeland and laid to rest.
Táimid ag caoineadh ort, a chara, agus tugaimid “pulang saludo” duit.