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José María Sison, born February 8, 1939 in Cabugao, Ilocos Sur, is a writer and intellectual who reorganized the Communist Party of the Philippines by combining elements of Maoism. Since August 2002, he is classified as a "person supporting terrorism" †by both the U.S., E.U. and other major Western countries.
Early Years
A graduate of the University of the Philippines in 1959, he studied in Indonesia, before returning to the Philippines to settle as a university professor of literature. In 1964, founded the Kabataang Makabayan or Patriotic Youth. This organization rallied Filipino youth against the Vietnam war, against the Marcos presidency and corrupt policians.
On December 26, 1968, he formed and chaired the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), an organization with a Marxism-Leninist philosophy, stemming from his experience as a youth leader and labor and land reform activist. This is known as the First Great Rectification movement where Sison and other radical youth criticized the exisitng Party leadership and failure. The reformed CPP included Maoism with the political line as well as the struggle for a National Democratic two-stage revolution rather than a Socialist revolution.
After this, the old PKP communist party sought to eliminate and marginalize Sison. However, the reorganized CPP had a larger base and renewed political line that attracted thousands to join its ranks.
On March 29, 1969, the CPP organized the New People's Army (NPA), the guerrilla-military wing of the Party, whose insurgencies around the Philippines, particularly in the northern part of the country, persist to this day. The NPA seeks to wage a peasant-worker revolutionary war in the countryside against landlords and foreign companies.
After The Martial Law, Sison was imprisoned and chained to a bed in a solitary cell. His experience was described in "Prison & Beyond" a book of poetry after he was released in 1986. He won the Southeast Asia WRITE award for the Philippines.
Exile
He went into exile in the Netherlands after the Ferdinand Marcos era. This was after he had been released from imprisonment by the government of Corazón Aquino for the sake of "national reconciliation" and for his role in opposing Marcos. The release of Sison was vehemently protested by the military. It is reported that upon his release, Sison and his followers actively sought to discredit the Aquino government in the European media by speaking out on Aquino's human rights violations including the Mendiola Massacre where the military fired on unarmed peasants in Manila killing 17. The result was Mrs. Aquino not winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986.
After the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo joined United States President George W. Bush, in using the event as a means of labeling Sison a terrorist. Sison's asylum status went into question as a result of the move and placed him in jeopardy of not having a viable home.
He is currently Chief Political Consultant of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines. Since 1987, Sison has resided in the Netherlands where he is seeking asylum as a political refugee. A 2004 court ruling by the European Union endangers the residency status of Sison in Europe and is expected to expel the CPP/NPA Chieftain anytime soon.
Controversies
1. Former Senator Jovito Salonga accused Sison of orchestrating the Bombing of Plaza Miranda during the Liberal Party Convention to force Marcos to suspend the writ of habeas corpus and sign Proclamation Number 1081 initiating the advent of Martial Law in the Philippines. This accusation comes from former CPP members such as Víctor Corpuz, Alex Magno and others.
2.He is also the primary initiator of the Second Great Rectification movement which ended a bloody internal purge of fellow comrades in the CPP/NPA suspected of being DPAs (deep penetrating agents) of the military during the 1980s and the 1990s.
In the mid to late 80's, certain CPP-NPA elements such as Víctor Corpuz, Popoy Lagman, Romulo Kintanar and Hector Mabilangan sought quick military victory against the Philippine government as mass protest against Marcos erupted in urban areas. With military victory for the CPP slower than expected, hysteria about DPAs were widespread initiating a purge. The purge killed thousands of people. Evidence of the bloody purge is beginning to surface with the discovery of mass graves in Quezon Province, Laguna, and in some parts of Mindanao. Former CPP/NPA member, Robert Francis García wrote a disturbing chronicle of the wild murders in his book, To Suffer Thy Comrade. This initiated the Second Great Rectification movement by Sison to end the bloody purges and to criticize leaders for errors that led to extreme actions such as the Campanyang Ahos. Many who disagreed with Sison were labeled as "Rejectionists," including those who sought merely military victory as well as those who wished to negotiate peace with the existing Philippine government.
3. He is reported to have overseen the trial of Popoy Lagman, Romulo Kintanar, Héctor Mabilangan and members of the CPP. These individuals were tried by a “people's court” composed mainly of peasants who were alleged victims of human rights violations caused during these individuals command. The defendants were said to have been denied the right to contest the complaints against them.
Quotations
"The people of the world, including progressive American forces, should forewarn the American people not to be carried away by jingoism, war hysteria and the anti-Arab and anti-Muslim drumbeat."
- José María Sison "At Home in the World: Portrait of a Revolutionary"
References
Terrorists | Chinese-Filipinos | 1939 births | Living people | Filipino communists | Filipino politicians | Letran alumni | People from Ilocos Sur | S.E.A. Write Award winners
"José María Sison"