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Wednesday, April 02, 2003
A date with the Red Army
By Joe A. Medinilla
First of a two-part series
SOMEWHERE IN SOUTHERN NEGROS ORIENTAL -- Malacaņang labels them "terrorists", businessmen brand them "extortionists", but farmers in neglected remote mountain barangays welcome them as "saviors".
They are in fact the New Peoples Army, armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines and the mainstream underground rebel movement conceived and born 34 years ago during the turbulence of the First Quarter Storm of the late 60s.
These thoughts flashed in my mind that Friday evening of March 21 as I made my way to an area in southern Negros Oriental for an interview with NPA leaders.
I was with two companions, a silent brooding man who I identified only as Dennis and a young woman who I later learned used the name Agnes.
The planned rendezvous was hatched three days before and was to include Jimmy P. Abayon, news editor of Sun.Star Dumaguete, who earlier interviewed a ranking NPA "White Committee" spokesperson in a safehouse just outside Dumaguete City on the approaching CPP-NPA founding anniversary. I learned later that my news editor failed to come because of a mix-up in the schedule.
I left Dumaguete City for the south about an hour just before sundown. We arrived at the first pick-up point marked by towering coconut trees around 6 p.m. Two passenger motorcycles folks call habal habal awaited to bring us to the next pick-up point, an almost one-hour ride through sugar cane and corn fields and swirling dust.
Since it was time for supper, we stopped over one mass base supporters' house for food. After supper, Dennis stayed while Agnes and myself went with another guide who fetched us for the last leg of our trip to the NPA camp somewhere in the foothills of the Negros Oriental mountain range, this time on foot.
We left past 9:00 that evening. All around us silence reigned punctuated only by the sounds of our footfalls and the incessant chirping and low humming of night insects, made more audible by the darkness that shrouded the rising landscape. There were no sign of habitation. We trudged on rough trails, ascended hillsides and negotiated dizzying tricky mountain paths overlooking dark bottomless valleys.
An hour after, we reached a forested area. From the darkness we heard the barking of dogs. We were approaching a house. We paused for rest. As we did so, seven heavily armed men in full battle gear peeled off from the dark and approached us. One handed an M16 armalite rifle and a bandolier to my woman-companion who proved to be an active NPA amazon.
Past 10 p.m. we resumed our walk, this time through dense foliage and climbed seemingly inaccessible mountain slopes. I was tired and weary from all that climbing and one of the armed men, I later learned as a certain Ka Christian offered to carry my bag, which I gladly accepted.
After what seemed like eternity, we arrived at the NPA camp. Men armed with high-powered firearms glinting visibly in the dull moonlight approached and shook my hand in warm welcome. I introduced myself as Albert, an identity I assumed following an advise from Agnes.
Some 30 minutes after we have had our rest and brief introductory talks, camp leader Kumander Arnaldo Silaw led us out of the camp for another safer base, a three-hour walk in single file formation in open areas and close formation in thick forests.
At around 2 a.m., we reached our destination -- a thickly forested mountain slope. We rested as my armed companions began stringing hammocks for our sleep that early dawn of March 22. (To be continued)
(April 2, 2003 issue)
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