Elements of 9th IDPA Retooled Community Support Program (RCSP) team killed July Barotillo, barangay secretary of Brgy. Lamon, Goa, Camarines Sur last October 1, 2021, at around 8 in the evening. The killing is part of the military and police’s campaign for violence to repress the all-out struggle of the masses of Camarines Sur against the extensive militarization in the province under RCSP.

Barotillo’s muder is the 204th case of political killing by state agents in Bikol ever since the start of Duterte’s term. All of the victims were civilians who were either disparaged to be ‘nanlaban’ or were killed during military and police operations.

The state’s armed forces versus the civilian population: this is what Duterte and NTF-ELCAC’s dirty repressive war, implemented by the 9th IDPA and JTFB in the region, looks like. Duterte’s tyranny is based on his kill and kill policy. Hence, with or without the presence of the NPA, it is the military and police’s mandate to systematically target unarmed masses and their communties. This is what happened to the thousands who were killed during the anti-illegal drugs campaign and Mindanao martial law.

However, 9th IDPA and JTFB’s widespread campagin of killing and targeting civilians will never be a proof of success for Duterte’s counterinsurgency campaign in the region. Rather, because of the massive killing and unparalleled poverty under the US-Duterte regime, the Bicolano masses’s fervor to advance the armed revolutionary struggle against state terrorism and the tyranny of the fascist state only grows even more. This is proven by BHB’s successful military actions across the region, including the snipe operations of Tomas Pilapil Command – BHB East Camarines Sur, in Brgy. Scout Fuentebella, against the RCSP teams operating in Goa and Santos Binamera Command- BHB Albay meting of justice against the antir-evolutionary criminal Police Staff Segeant Allan Madelar.

Silence and muteness in the face of the need to make Duterte and AFP-PNP-CAFGU accountable for their crimes will never be acceptable for the Bicolano masses. The revolutionary movement shall certainly be by the side of the Bikolano masses in their struggle for life, livelihood and their future. It is a challenge to every unit of the NPA, Party committees and all revolutionary mass organizations to overcome all hardships in facing the military’s attacks, heighten their capabilities in launching the guerilla warfare and fortify their united strength to completely defeat the US-Duterte regime’s dirty, repressive war.