MANILA, Philippines — A statement from the press agency of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), Ang Bayan, announced on Saturday that Jose Maria “Joma” its founder, has passed away at the age of 83.
According to the report, Sison died on Friday around 8:40 p.m., Philippine time, at a hospital in Utrecht, Netherlands.
“Ang Bayan pays the highest tribute to CPP founding chairman, great Marxist-Leninist-Maoist thinker, patriot, internationalist and revolutionary leader, Jose Maria Sison. He passed away yesterday at around 8:40 p.m. (PH time) after two weeks of confinement in the hospital. He was 83.”
Ang Bayan
“The entire Communist Party of the Philippines gives the highest possible tribute to its founding chairman, great Marxist-Leninist-Maoist thinker, patriot, internationalist and revolutionary leader.”
“Even as we mourn, we vow [to] continue to give all our strength and determination to carry the revolution forward guided by the memory and teachings of the people’s beloved Ka Joma,” it added.
On December 26, 1968, Sison launched the CPP. He was apprehended by the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in November 1977, under the dictatorship of late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., then liberated in March 1986, following the EDSA revolution. Sison asked for political asylum in the Netherlands in 1988 after the Philippines invalidated his passport.
Former President Rodrigo Duterte also released a statement on the death of his former teacher at Lyceum University in the 1960s.
“While Mr. Sison and I have had many disagreements – especially in the ways in which he chose to pursue and effect change in the country – I would like to believe that, at the end of the day, we shared the same dream of creating a better future for every Filipino.”
FORMER PRESIDENT RODRIGO DUTERTE