On this September 21, 2020, the Filipino people are united in commemorating the day on which the puppet fascist dictator Ferdinand Marcos signed Proclamation No. 1081, putting the entire Philippines under martial law, marking the beginning of his 14-year one-man dystopian rule over the nation.

With the prevalence of the Duterte clique’s civil-military junta that effectively lords over the country, and the fairly recent ratification of the Anti-Terrorism Act, this year’s 48th anniversary of the pangs of the puppet Marcos fascist dictatorship entails grave significance to all patriotic and freedom loving Filipinos, in that the open terrorist US-Duterte regime–unlike the predecessor pseudo-democratic administrations that followed after the first People Power Revolution, cloaking their fascist puppetry with thin veils of so called democracy– more than parallels the puppet Marcos fascist dictatorship, in terms of human rights violations, imperialist subservience bootlicking, foreign debt, neoliberal economic offensives, criminality, graft and corruption, anti-people scheming, an ever worsening political-economic crisis, and outright terrorist attacks on the people.

The Filipino people, especially the great masses of workers and peasants, are enduring unprecedented levels of hardships and sufferings due to the US-Duterte civil-military junta’s open terrorist, treacherous, bloodthirsty, plundering dominion over the Filipino nation; and its failed response to the public health and economic crises engendered by the novel coronavirus.

In the midst of unprecedented global economic and public health crises in the modern history of monopoly capitalism, amidst increasingly heightening inter-imperialist contradictions, a new puppet fascist dictatorship has arisen, exploiting to the maximum extent the COVID-19 pandemic and its concomitant political-economic crisis, grips the Filipino nation, unleashing the full might of the puppet reactionary armed forces to suppress the struggles of the people, pillaging the land, siphoning and milking the nation’s coffers and wealth dry, all to the benefit of a wicked few, the parasites of Philippine society – the big comprador-landlords, the criminal bureaucrats, and their imperialist masters.

In the social volcano that is Negros Island, notably in the province of Negros Oriental, this new martial law has turned Sugarland into a killing field, robbing the workers and peasants of life and property, devastating the broad masses of Negrosanons, who have been treated like cattle for fascist slaughter. The Sagay 9 massacre, SEMPO 1 (Oplan Sauron 1), SEMPO 2 (Oplan Sauron 2), SEMPO 3 (Oplan Bran Stark), and the hundreds of cases of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, tortures, enforced and fake surrenders, fabricated evidences and charges, illegal arrests and detentions, military occupations of communities, destruction of civilian properties, and numerous other types of human rights violations perpetrated since the implementation of Oplan Kapayapaan, MO32, EO70, and Oplan Kapanatagan, and the Anti-Terrorism Act on the island will forever live in infamy, etched into the annals of Philippine history as one of the most bloody attacks executed by the fascist puppet GRP on the people of Negros.

The SEMPO framework, tried and tested in Negros Oriental, in tandem with the methods and tactics of the old Duterte Death Squad tokhang style assassinations that swept every nook and cranny of the country’s urban dwellings, has been applied nationwide, sowing terror, wreaking havoc in the urban and rural communities, severely putting at risk the lives and properties of the masses of workers and peasants, deliberately targeting them for counter-revolutionary fascist violence.

Coming face-to-face with the fascist mercenaries, with the enemy employing more than 3,000 fascist troops, the settler masses of Negros Oriental, notably in its 3rd District, have tasted the bitterness of SEMPO. Not giving into fear, throwing themselves right into violent class struggle, the organized masses of the mountainous baryos of Southeast Negros have victoriously faced and overcome the 3 waves of SEMPO, emerging out of the onslaught much stronger, grittier, and more solid than ever before.

During this time of economic hardships and counter-revolutionary state terrorism, circumstances are gradually turning the revolutionary workers, peasants, urban petty-bourgeoisie, especially the youth of Southeast Negros onto the path of revolutionary armed struggle for national and social liberation.

The Kabataang Makabayan – Southeast Negros echoes the Communist Party of the Philippines’ call to the Filipino nation’s vigorous youth, to follow on the footsteps of the KM pioneers and forefathers, to flock to the countryside, take up arms, and wage revolutionary war to oust the puppet fascist dictator Rodrigo Duterte, to destroy the semi-colonial and semi-feudal foundations of Philippine society, and to build a new Philippines that is truly free, prosperous progressive, just, democratic, and peaceful, paving the way for a bright socialist future.

Filipino youth, ever dauntless, the countryside beckons to you. Take up arms and wage revolution to oust the puppet fascist dictator Duterte!