Gelsenkirchen, December 17, 2022

Dear Comrades of the Communist Party of the Philippines,

Dear Julieta de Lima,

We have learned last night that Comrade José Maria Sison, Founding Chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines, passed away on December 16, 2022 at the age of 83.

On behalf of the Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany and our youth organization REBELL, we extend our heartfelt and solidarity condolences to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its members, to the members of all national-democratic organizations in the Philippines and especially to his wife Julieta de Lima on the death of Comrade Joma! His death is a great loss to the CPP, the revolutionary struggle for national and social liberation in the Philippines and the international revolutionary movement.

Joma had been a leader in the revolutionary movement and in the Youth League since 1961. He was the founding chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines since late 1968 and built one of the most important revolutionary parties after the revisionist betrayal with the 20th Party Congress of the CPSU. He dedicated over 60 years of his life to anti-imperialist resistance and the struggle for socialism. For this he was persecuted by the Marcos dictatorship and imprisoned for seven years, two years in solitary confinement chained to a cot. Since the late 1980s, José Maria Sison lived in exile in the Netherlands. US imperialism declared him and the CPP as terrorists in 2002. At no time did Joma Sison allow himself to be intimidated by anti-communist repression or to be diverted from his path.

Joma has led the struggle against revisionism all his life. He had a prominent role in the struggle to rebuild the international Marxist-Leninist and workers’ movement and encouraged many organizations to participate in the international liberation struggle. He was theoretically adept and had great tactical skill in working with a wide variety of organizations. Stefan Engel met José Maria Sison personally during his time in exile in the early 1990s. Both of them worked closely together in the International Conference of Marxist-Leninist Parties and Organizations, taking turns as the main coordinator in it.

Stefan Engel and Joma Sison were connected for 30 years by a personal friendship, borne by mutual respect and solidarity. The international seminar in 1993 on “100 Years of Mao Zedong”, which drew lessons from the revisionist betrayal of socialism and became an important contribution to the reconstruction of the international Marxist-Leninist and workers’ movement and to a new upswing in the struggle for socialism, became a significant high light in the joint struggle against revisionism. The publication of the documentation of this seminar and the book in defense of the proletarian cultural revolution, which was published in China, remain imperishable common ideological-political contributions to the international revolutionary and workers’ movement.

Joma Sison will also be remembered as a very culturally-minded person. He began to write poetry during the most difficult times of his solitary confinement.

Dear Julieta, dear comrades of the CPP,

the world revolutionary movement loses one of its most experienced heads. We lose José Maria Sison, a comrade in struggle for decades and a good friend, who inspired us in many conversations and joint activities and enriched our work.

His death is an obligation for us to maintain the close friendship between our two parties in the spirit of proletarian internationalism, to continue the anti-imperialist struggle and the struggle to unite the international revolutionary parties and organizations to prepare and carry out the international revolution for the worldwide victory of socialism with all our strength!

With revolutionary and fraternal greetings

Gabi Fechtner, Party Chairwoman of the MLPD

Stefan Engel, Central Committee of the MLPD, Head of the Editorial Office REVOLUTIONARY WAY

Monika Gärtner-Engel, Head of Internationalism of the Central Committee of the MLPD

Peter Weispfenning, Central Commitee of the MLPD, Responsible Person for the relations with the Philippines