TRUTH REVEALED. Assistant Prosecutor Flosemer Chris Gonzales, spokesperson for the Western Visayas Regional Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (RTF6-ELCAC) said the death of Chad Booc in an encounter with government troops in Barangay Andap, New Bataan, Davao de Oro on Thursday (Feb. 24, 2022) has unmasked the pattern of lies and deception of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front. In a statement released on Saturday (February 26), Gonzales said Booc is a CPP-NPA-NDF cadre masquerading as an activist. (PNA file photo)
ILOILO CITY – The death of Chad Booc following a 15-minute firefight with the 1001st Infantry Brigade of the Philippine Army in Purok-8, Barangay Andap, New Bataan, Davao de Oro on Thursday has unmasked the pattern of lies and deception of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front (CPP-NPA-NDF).
The Western Visayas Regional Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (RTF6-ELCAC) in a statement released on Saturday said the "CPP-NPA-NDF has to swallow once more the bitter pill of truth."
“The propaganda lines and lies that they peddle to the Filipino people blow up in their faces because the truth has a peculiar way of unmasking the CPP-NPA-NDF pattern of lies and deception,” Regional task force spokesperson Assistant Prosecutor Flosemer Chris Gonzales said.
Booc is a CPP-NPA-NDF cadre masquerading as an activist, Gonzales added.
He was among those arrested in Cebu City on Feb.15, 2021 for human trafficking involving several indigenous peoples (IP) children from Talaingod, Davao del Norte but was ordered released by a local court in May of the same year.
“A concerted effort was made to vilify the government and in particular the NTF-ELCAC because the CPP-NPA-NDF propaganda machinery worked overtime to portray the image of Chad as an alleged volunteer teacher, an activist, and someone who purportedly champions the rights of IP children whom the CPP-NPA-NDF collectively (and erroneously) referred to as Lumad children,” the statement added.
The task force spokesperson said that every time CPP-NPA-NDF members are arrested during operations conducted by government forces, their propagandists are quick to label them as activists, likewise maligning the government and the NTF-ELCAC.
“These CPP-NPA-NDF terrorists wearing the masks of activists and human rights defenders eventually expose themselves for what they really are when they end up in the casualty list in armed encounters with government troops in hinterland areas where their hideouts and lairs are located,” he said.
The truth unmasked also vindicated the national task force and set IP communities from the CPP-NPA-NDF reign of terror, Gonzales added.
The Western Visayas task force, meanwhile, commended the 10th Infantry Division of the Philippine Army for their successful anti-terrorism campaign in the Davao region.
The CPP-NPA is listed as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the Philippines.
The Anti-Terrorism Council also formally designated the NDF as a terrorist organization on June 23, 2021, citing it as “an integral and inseparable part” of the CPP-NPA that was created in April 1973. (PNA)
