The youngest daughter of Bayan Muna Partylist Representative Euphemia Cullamat who got killed in a military operation in Surigao del Sur was not a martyr but a victim of the deception of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed wing, the New People's Army (NPA), the government's top security adviser disclosed Tuesday.
(Rep. Cullamat's office / MANILA BULLETIN)
National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon Jr. said 22-year-old Jevilyn Cullamat "lost her life for a forsaken cause" even as he extended his sympathies to the family of Rep. Cullamat.
Esperon said he is "troubled" that some people allegedly allied with the CPP-NPA "have the gall to politicize and romanticize" the death of Jevilyn by branding her as a martyr.
"I refuse to call her as such. Jevilyn was not a martyr. She was deceived into sacrificing her life for a cause lacking legitimacy and noble purpose. She was a victim of a manipulative organization that has taken advantage of her from the moment she was radicalized until her recruitment into the armed struggle," he said.
Jevilyn was killed in an armed confrontation with elements of the Philippine Army's 3rd Special Forces Battalion in Barangay San Isidro, Marihatag town last Saturday, November 28.
The military said she was an NPA medic for the Sandatahang Yunit Pampropaganda (SYP) Platoon of the Northeastern Regional Committee's Guerilla Front 10.
In wake of Jevilyn's death, Esperon went on to link the Cullamat clan with the CPP-NPA and its alleged front organizations.
He claimed that Jevilyn's uncle, Pablito Campos Jr., was a secretary of the Guerrilla Front 21 of the Northeastern Mindanao Regional Committee.
Meanwhile, Esperon said Jevilyn's aunt, Gloria Tumalon, was the alleged leader of the Malahutayong Pakigbisog Alang sa Sumusunod (MAPASU), a Lumad organization tagged by the militar as a front group of the CPP-NPA.
Esperon also said that Jevilyn's father was "involved in the underground movement."
Campos was arrested by the authorities on Feb. 23, 2018 while Tumalon was captured for kidnapping and serious illegal detention in March of this year. The Cullamat patriarch was arrested in Visayas for murder and illegal possession of explosives.
Human rights groups condemned their arrests and claimed that the charges filed against them were all trumped up.
But Esperon maintained that Jevilyn's death was a "proof" of the Cullamat clan's "deep rooted radicalization" and the "exploitation of the Indigenous Peoples' community."
"We call on the sympathizers of the NPA to ponder on their support for the movement that has claimed the lives of thousands of Filipinos," he said.
Esperon made the remark after left-leaning members of the Bayan Muna Partylist condemned Jevilyn's death and called her a martyr who fought against the alleged injustices committed by "state forces" against the Lumads.
Rep. Cullamat said that she respects her daughter's decision to join the armed struggle after she witnessed the supposed abuses and killings of local and tribal leaders and Alcadev officials in Surigao del Sur.
"Malaking karangalan sa akin na nagkaroon ng isang anak na naging martir at mandirigma (It is a great honor for me to have a child who became a martyr and a warrior," Rep. Cullamat said.