The death of Salvador G. Liked ended his landgrabbing and blackmailing victimizing our kakailian in Mt. Province.

The Leonardo Pacsi Command (NPA-Mt. Province) had been receiving from locals reports of landgrabbing in the areas between Bauko and Sagada perpetrated by Liked and his cohorts in the bureaucracy. Clans and families had fallen victim to his schemes. Liked even “donated” to a public utility a parcel of land he had grabbed. He also attempted to privatize a communal water source to sell water to the municipality of Bauko.

Liked put up an anti-corruption stance as he delved into purportedly anomalous deals and practices. However, his sincerity towards combating bureaucratic corruption and government ineptitude had been questionable, given that he chose to enter into settlements and even resorted to blackmailing and antisocial activities, instead of pursuing those cases. He made use of his educational background, skills, and connections to further his own interests.

The LPC had reached out to Liked in 2018, warned him to stop his landgrabbing schemes, and advised him to sincerely pursue the graft and corruption cases he had filed in order to convict abusive officials in government. However, he continued with his modus operandi even when he became a barangay councilor.

As a public official, he employed the aforementioned modus operandi at the expense of the land and livelihood of peasants. As an Igorot, he had run counter to the progressive traditional values of inayan, collectivism, and self-determination. How such a modus operandi thrives further attests to the inherent corruption, rottenness, and exploitation under the current semicolonial and semifeudal system.

Whether in public office or not, our fellow i-Montanyosa must challenge the current unjust system and forward the struggle for people’s rights and welfare. At the forefront of this struggle is the revolutionary movement under the leadership of the CPP, that which truly puts first the interests of the oppressed and exploited masses and strives to establish a genuinely democratic people’s government.