NAGA CITY -- For 37 years now, the Bicol region figures prominently in a protracted guerilla warfare the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) is waging, according to a study by a human rights lawyer and peace advocate in the award-winning book “2005 Human Development Report” (a National Academy of Science and Technology’s Best Filipino Social Science book in 2006).

        Lawyer Soliman Santos Jr., a petitioner against the anti-terror law filed at the Supreme Court and the author of a study titled “Cost of Armed Conflict in Bicol”, looked back at the armed insurgency in the region in 1970, when the first regional committee of the CPP-NPA was established in Southern Luzon.

        “The following year, open hostilities broke out in Southern Luzon when government forces were ambushed (by NPA rebels) in San Pedro, Iriga City,” Santos noted.

        He observed that a number of Bicolano students and labor activists went back to their hometowns in the 1970s to engage in teach-ins and attend to the region-wide expansion of the CPP-NPA organization.

        Santos credited one pioneer Bicolano NPA fighter, Romulo Jallores (now the name of the NPA command in Camarines Sur) to have established in Tigaon, Camarines Sur the first NPA rebels’ base in the region.

        Jallores, who had achieved a folk-hero status in Camarines Sur, seriously wounded in a bloody encounter with the Philippine Constabulary (PC) soldiers, was cornered and finished off in December 1971 by pursuing government forces while he was taking refuge in a cousin’s house in this city.

        Santos saw the growth of the CPP-NPA here in 1972 after the dramatic and horrible deaths of Ruben Jallores, the younger brother of Romulo, and five companions in the hands of PC soldiers. The Jallores brothers were sons of poor abaca farmer and stripper in Tigaon town, whom the author said made “intergenerational impact” on the family, wherein relatives eventually joined the rebels’ group.

        “The large crowd that flocked the Catholic Church where their bodies were brought and to the funeral procession signaled the growth of the CPP-NPA movement, escalation of armed conflict in Camarines Sur and throughout the mainland Bicol (two Camarines provinces, Albay and Sorsogon),” the lawyer, a native of Camarines Sur, remarked.

        In a 12-province table of armed conflict between the NPA rebels and government forces from 1986-2004, Camarines Sur and Albay figured out among the provinces in the list.

        It is revealing Metro Manila was among the listed areas with the highest number of armed encounters involving NPA rebels and government forces. Included as well were the provinces of Quezon, Davao del Norte, Cagayan, Davao Oriental, Isabela, Agusan del Sur, Surigao del Sur and Kalinga-Apayao.

        The continuing prominence of Bicol in the CPP-NPA protracted guerilla warfare was also shown by Santos in the incident of captured government forces in the region, specifically the capture of an Army lieutenant and a private in Tinambac, Camarines Sur on March 1, 2004.

        In 1999, the NPA rebels earlier captured Army intelligence officer Roberto Bernal. In both incidents, the captive soldiers were released to the International Red Cross with full coverage of news wires and networks.

        Santos presented quantifiable costs of the armed insurgency in terms of destruction of facilities like Globe and Smart cell sites, burning of busses and heavy equipment owned by individuals or companies believed punished by NPA rebels for not paying revolutionary taxes.

        Santos ascertained the NPA rebels demand anywhere from P50,000 to P200,000 per cell site, per year, or as much as P500,000 for a newly set-up cell site. He cited revelation of barangay officials in Pio Duran, Albay, that they pay a revolutionary tax of P1,000 every quarter, broken down as follows: P600 from the council and P400 from internal revenue allotment (IRA) of the barangay.

        “Revolutionary taxes are claimed as legitimate way of generating funds for revolutionary government. Taxes are collected from farmers every harvest time, and from fisherfolk, small businessmen (owners of karaoke joints and sari-sari stores), government infrastructure projects and private contractors…….where revolutionary taxes can amount to anywhere between 5 and 10 percent of the project, regardless of the project,” he expounded.

        Bicol is the third poorest region in the country, trailed only by Central Mindanao and Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), with at least 53.1 percent of the population in 2000 are poor.

        Santos accounted 25,000 combat-related deaths to have occurred since 1969 and over 50,000 displaced by the armed conflict here.