Tirbute to a mother, who holds half the sky with the father

Letter to the Editor: CPP gives tribute to Cadre
Sunday, June 17, 2012 02:11:01 PM

Mindanao Examiner
http://mindanaoexaminer.com/news.php?news_id=20120617021101

Tribute to Maria Eleanor P. Dandoy: Revolutionary Cadre, True Leader.
October 29, 1969- June 12, 2012

The Regional Party Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines, Southern Mindanao region gives its highest tribute to comrade Maria Eleanor P. Dandoy, revolutionary leader and cadre, who passed away last June 12, 2012 after 11 days of suffering complications from lupus erythematosus, an immune system disease.

To comrades in the SMRRegional Party Committee and the Regional Committee on Towns and Cities or RCTC, Maria Eleanor, or Ka Milet, left a legacy of strong commitment, revolutionary fervor and perseverance in the face of hard struggle.

Tenacious and daring, Ka Milet exemplified this brand of leadership in the urban party committee, from her foray with comrades in the youth and students sector, workers in Davao region, her role in the recovery of Davao del Norte territory, and her leadership in Davao city urban committee and the RCTC.

Over the more than two decades of revolutionary struggle as full-time Party cadre, Ka Milet was part of the revival of the urban mass movement.

Her social awakening was early. Politics sprang first as an offshoot of positive influence by close relatives who figured prominently during the early 1980’s in the anti-fascist struggle against the US-Marcos dictatorship.

As a teenager of high school age, she already quite understood the justness of the struggle of the workers, urban poor, women and youth.

At that time, the urban district in which her family residence was located was generally known to be one of the strongholds of social revolution in Davao City.Her sympathies for the oppressed were aroused when she had to bring food and care for her uncle and political detainee.

She found herself formally involved in the revolutionary struggle in a period where the authoritarian regime, at the behest of US Imperialism, was in a brutal rampage against the Filipino people. And when the open fascist rule was in death throes, her political life blossomed. It came as no surprise that in no time, she saw herself in the arms of the Kabataang Makabayan and eventually, the Communist Party of the Philippines. Ka Milet embraced the revolutionary cause firmly from then on.

In college at the Ateneo De Davao University, she studied Economics and graduated as an average student. But far more important was that beyond the confines of bourgeois academics, she fully grasped the political economy of Philippine society, the need for concrete action and the correct path to social transformation.

In such pursuits, she did an outstanding political work among the studentry and the masses. She did EDs and joined rallies, albeit briefly, on purpose. Because she devoted more time -- in the background, so to speak -- in the environs of cadre work.

An outstanding cadre she came to be. In the provinces and in the cities, and in the specific sectors of assignment from one time to another, she developed into a fine political partisan, driven by a liberating and great historical purpose, armed with passion and equipped with brilliant mass movement skills.

Ka Milet was never one to back down in healthy debates and intra-Party discussions. She was at the forefront of internal struggles, seeking correct ideas and the right policy, sifting truth from the untruth, and resolving problems that greatly affect the ideological, political and organizational life of the Party.

In striving to reverse temporary setbacks and advance the urban mass movement, Ka Milet took the conscious and difficult task of being a rabble-rouser, unafraid to identify mistakes and learn from criticism and self-criticism. She spoke what some colleagues dared not speak and criticized fairly and accepted criticism wholeheartedly.

And adding to her character was that she was a loving mother and wife, a caring daughter and sister, and a kind friend.

She would give sound advice to comrades on revolutionary motherhood, even as she herself expressed the tremendous balancing act of being both mother and cadre during the two difficult periods of her personal life -- in the mid1990s when she and her husband had to evade severe security threats and in the last five years at the time of her husband’s incarceration.

To her husband, she was a revolutionary partner, who had to make hard decisions and sacrifice, whose sincerity to comrades and to the organization had to take primacy over their married life.

In recovering Davao del Norte territory, engaging in the open peasant mass movement and guerilla bases support in the 1990s, Ka Milet had to contend with her young family, a husband who found difficulties in adjusting to mainstream life after a long stint with the New People’s Army, and children who found it hard to get to used to a string of safe houses. It was a life on the run for Ka Milet and her family.

To her brother, Ka Milet was the sister who gave both political advice and genuine care to nieces and nephews, to siblings and to her mother in their close knit family.

In the difficult life of revolutionary struggle, Ka Milet was firm and gentle, sturdy and stable…a true leader, a dear comrade.

Her oftentimes, strict demeanor have provoked many colleagues and comrades, but her strong-willed disposition have tempered through the years, in the same vein as she and comrades have strived to achieve both political and organizational maturity and greater Party unity.

As we bid her farewell, we execute our collective salute to Ka Milet and pin another medal of greatness in our common memory for her worthy attributes and weighty contributions to the people’s struggle.

(Sgd.) Siegfried M. Red
Secretary
Southern Mindanao Regional Party Committee
smrc.cpp@gmail.com

Ngayong Fathers' Day, nag-alay ng bulaklak si Niki Gamara sa kanyang ama na nakadetine sa Crame. Umapela si Niki sa "anak ng dati ring bilanggong pulitikal" (na si Bengino Aquino Jr.) na palayain ang mga bilanggong pulitikal na patuloy na nawawalay sa kanilang mga anak at mahal-sa-buhay at nasa bingid ng panganib sa kamay ng pulis at militar. (Gregorio Dantes Jr. mula sa Pinoy Weekly)
 

KARAPATAN-NCR FREE RENANTE GAMARA MOVEMENT

NEWS RELEASE

June 17, 2012

Sons, daughters of detained NDFP consultants stage Father’s Day rally & visit in Camp Crame Children of political prisoners wishes urgent release of their dads for Father’s Day General, unconditional and omnibus amnesty -

This is how the sons and daughters of detained peace consultants of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) want the kind of release to be given to their dads by the government this Father’s Day.

To date, around 363 political prisoners were reported under the administration of President Benigno Simeon Aquino III.

The statement has been made as relatives and supporters of the four NDFP consultants detained at the PNP Custodial Center of Camp Crame in Quezon City staged a picket protest and Father’s Day visit today. The said political detainees in Camp Crame are Renante Gamara, Allan Jazmines, Eduardo Serrano and Eddie Sarmiento.

On the rally at the Camp Crame gate, protesters bring flowers, cards, gifts and pictures of the imprisoned fathers as they read the letters of the four while in detention. After the short program, relatives enter Camp Crame Custodial Center to greet and visit their family heads. Led by human rights group, Karapatan-National Capital Region and the newly-formed Free Renante Gamara Movement, they call on the attention of President Aquino to immediately release all political prisoners nationwide without any conditions.

The groups also launched today an online petition through http://www.change.org/petitions/free-tatay-nante-gamara that aims to gather support in their call and campaign to the Aquino administration. ‘As son of a former political prisoner (former Senator Benigno ‘Ninoy’ Aquino, Jr.) during Martial Law, we, the sons and daughters of all political prisoners, appeal to President Aquino to grant our demand to free all political prisoners. We hope that PNoy will heed us for his father also suffered to be away from them as a political prisoner,’ says Niki Gamara, spokesperson of the Free Renante Gamara Movement and daughter of Renante Gamara.

She added, ‘We wish that PNoy will be able to remember and understand how it is to live away from our fathers and relatives who are currently in detention due to trump-up charges. It is indeed unacceptable to see families and homes break due to political beliefs of individuals.’ Finally, Karapatan-NCR also added that similar Father’s Day activity will also be held at the Paranaque City Jail today, 1:00 in the afternoon as the 10 fathers from Silverio Compound were still detained after the bloody and violent demolition that took place in the said area last April 23.

A relative of a political detainee gets emotional during a protest rally outside Camp Crame in Quezon city suburban Manila. Photo Credit: Ezra Acayan of DEMOTIX

Emosyonal na nagsalita si Niki Gamara, estudyante ng University of the Philippines at anak ng bilanggong pulitikal na si Reynante Gamara, sa harap ng Kampo Crame, Quezon City para ipanawagan ang paglaya ng kanyang ama. Dinukot ng militar at pulisya si Gamara noong Abril 3 at inakusahang lider-rebelde. (Gregorio Dantes Jr. mula sa Pinoy Weekly)