‘SENSELESS’. The body of Chad Booc when it was recovered after an an encounter with troops of the 1001st Infantry Brigade in New Bataan, Davao de Oro on Thursday (Feb. 24, 2022). Booc was arrested in Cebu City last year for alleged trafficking of students from indigenous people's communities but was later ordered released by a local court along with six others. (Photo courtesy of 10ID)
MANILA – Chad Booc, the slain activist, teacher, and student recruiter, wrongly believed that armed struggle will bring peace and development.
In a letter posted on Facebook on Friday, former Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) cadre Ariane Jane Ramos wrote that she never met the 27-year-old Booc but her “heart weeps because we did not have the chance to save you”.
Booc, a University of the Philippines-Diliman Computer Science cum laude graduate, was killed along with four others in an encounter with military forces in Davao de Oro on February 24.
“I know that you have become the best human being as you embraced the profession of being a revolutionary, a Red fighter. You wholeheartedly believed (and so did I) that winning the People's Democratic Revolution thru armed struggle of the CPP-NPA-NDF (National Democratic Front) is the only solution in order to achieve peace, justice and equality,” wrote Ramos, who was known as Ka Marikit while serving the communist terrorist group. “But you are wrong. We are wrong.”
Ramos said genuine service should not be done by means of war against your countrymen.
“It is seen by our willingness to build roads even for others whose ideologies we do not agree with. This paves the way for us to know dialectically what are the causes why such uprisings occur. With this, we can create the right formula to end this longest running communist insurgency in the world. And save lives,” she wrote.
Ramos was carrying the child of partner Daniel Bandalan (alias Regoy), also an NPA officer, when she surrendered to authorities in August last year
She was the party wife of Rommel Tausan, another NPA commanding officer who died in a military operation.
“You heaved your last breath while courageously exchanging blows with the government troops. You fought for the masses, but your death served as a senseless consequence of a useless war,” Ramos told her fellow “iskolar ng bayan” (nation’s scholar).
The CPP-NPA is listed as a terrorist organization by the United States, 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)
