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Persevere in the National Democratic Revolution! Celebrate the 30 years of struggle of the NDFP!

KAGUMA
Katipunan ng mga Gurong Makabayan
(teachers)
April 24, 2003

The Katipunan ng mga Gurong Makabayan (KAGUMA) is one with all of the other allied organizations of the National Democratic Front in celebrating its 30th anniversary. The formation of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) in 1973, under the auspices of the Communist Party of the Philippines, was a timely response to the intensifying struggle of the Filipino people against the US-Marcos fascist dictatorship.

KAGUMA itself was formed in 1971 to consolidate the efforts of numerous patriotic and progressive teachers who responded to the call of participating in and propagating the need for a national democratic revolution with a socialist perspective. When Martial Law was declared in 1972, KAGUMA, along with all other democratic mass organizations, was suppressed. But its members persevered in the struggle by joining the underground revolutionary movement or the New People's Army.

With the formation of the NDFP, the members of KAGUMA were able to unite with all patriotic and democratic classes and sectors in the common struggle for national liberation and social emancipation. The program of the NDFP reflects the democratic aspirations of the Filipino people as well as the particular interest of the education sector.

Under US imperialism and the joint dictatorship of the comprador bourgeoisie and the landlord class, the education system will remain to be irrelevant, repressive, and in a state of decay. For it is only through the victory of the national democratic revolution can the groundwork be laid for a progressive, nationalist, scientific, and mass-oriented culture and education system. The current reactionary state will continue to neglect our economic welfare, violate our democratic rights, and curtail academic freedom. Teachers and other education workers can only break the chains of oppression and exploitation and fully realize their rights and potentials with the overthrow of the neocolonial state and the complete overhaul of the current semi-feudal system.

But even in the course of waging the national democratic revolution, the NDFP and KAGUMA have made great strides in the propagation of a progressive, nationalist, scientific and mass-oriented culture. Literacy and numeracy programs are being undertaken in the countrysides. Progressive cultural groups have contributed significantly in raising the awareness of peoples and communities through the propagation of various cultural forms. Members of KAGUMA and other progressive teachers have been going beyond what is being taught in current textbooks and curricula to propagate patriotism, awareness of rights, critical and scientific thinking among the youth and students.

KAGUMA has been at the core of the struggle of teachers and other education workers for their economic welfare and democratic rights. It has linked the education sector with the masses of workers and peasants as well as other democratic classes and sectors in the struggle against imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucratic capitalism. KAGUMA continues to encourage its members to work in the countrysides to help in the literacy and numeracy campaigns and to participate directly in the armed revolution.

Under the NDFP, the unity of all allied organizations for the national democratic revolution with a socialist perspective is ever growing stronger. In the course of the struggle, KAGUMA, as well as all the other allied organizations of the NDFP, continue to expand and consolidate its ranks. With the NDFP, the allied organizations and other legal democratic organizations and forces are able to build long-term and tactical linkages and alliances to fight against a common enemy and for a common cause.

Together with other forces, parties, groups, and organizations, we have ousted two presidents in a period of 15 years. With the ever-worsening crisis of imperialism and the domestic semi-colonial, semi-feudal system and the perseverance and determination of the CPP-NPA-NDF, the Filipino people can eventually achieve victory in the national democratic revolution.###