VERONICA Tabara, president of Kapatiran Para sa Progresong Panlipunan Inc. (Kapatiran), revealed Thursday, May 11, that Rafael Baylosis will take the place left by the late Jose Maria Sison as chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), and the face of the country's communist movement.
Tabara, a former member of the party's central committee, said that based on her knowledge of the members of the senior cadres, Baylosis will replace Sison as party chairman.
She said Baylosis, who is from Luzon, is the most senior CPP official.
In December last year, the CPP confirmed that Sison, the iconic leader of the communist movement in the Philippines died at age 83.
Sison has lived in self-imposed exile in Europe ever since peace talks with the government bogged down in 1987.
Baylosis, a member of the NDFP Reciprocal Working Group on Political and Constitutional Reforms and allegedly the acting secretary of the New People's Army, was arrested in January 2018 by the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group
Kapatiran is composed of former members of the Rebolusyonaryong Partido ng Manggagawa ng Pilipinas/Revolutionary Proletarian Army/Alex Boncayao Brigade-Tabara Paduano Group (RPMP/RPA/ABB-TPG) who has signed a peace agreement with the national government.
Tabara who is co-chair of the Joint Enforcement Monitoring Committee was at the Capitol for the meeting of the Provincial Peace and Order Site Coordinating Team meeting.
The Provincial Site Coordinating Team was created through Executive Order No.29-12, Series of 2020, to assist the Joint Enforcement Monitoring Committee (JEMC) in providing appropriate interventions to Kapatiran under the three year normalization to sustain and strengthen the peace and development agenda of the province.
On December 6, 2000, the government and RPM-P/RP/ABB signed a peace agreement to end armed hostilities and commence the process of addressing the root causes of armed conflict.
The agreement resulted in the joint execution to end hostilities with the commitment of then RPM-P/RPA/ABB to the disposition of arms and forces, and the commitment of GPH for the release of alleged political offenders and/or political prisoners and the dropping or dismissal of charges of RPM-P/RPA/ABB officers and members, in accordance with existing laws.*