The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) denied that Hannah Jay Cesista, a Bar passer who died in an encounter by state security forces with New People’s Army (NPA) in Bohol, was tortured and killed.
Col. Francel Margareth Padilla, AFP spokesperson, said that claims on the circumstances of the death of Cesista, who passed the Bar examinations in 2022, were mere speculations to conceal the NPA’s deception.
“These are just speculations. We speak about the facts that we receive from the… facts that were given to us from the ground,” she said on Tuesday, February 27.
The military spokesperson noted that the AFP would not dignify the “propaganda” being spread by the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed wing, the NPA, regarding the operation in Bohol last week.
“The CPP-NPA can say what they want to say to conceal their deception and cruel ways against our people. We stand by the legitimacy of our operations,” she stressed.
The AFP said that joint military and police personnel encountered remnants of the NPA’s Bohol Party Committee (BPC) in Bilar, Bohol on February 23, which resulted in the death of five communist rebels. They were identified as Cesista, Domingo Compoc, Parlito Historia, Marlon Omosura and Alberto Sancho – collectively known as “Bilar 5”.
"Hannah Jay Cesista was a victim of the communist-terrorist group’s deception and ideology. It was unfortunate that such a loss occurred and she could have been a productive member of our society, who could have contributed in advancing peace and protecting our people from the ways of the CPP-NPA," Padilla said.
However, the National Union of People’s Lawyers (NUPL) condemned the death of Cesista and her companions as they claimed that no encountered occurred and the Bilar 5 were allegedly taken alive, tortured and killed by the government forces.
“Several accounts support that no encounter has transpired. Instead, the five individuals were ordered to vacate the house where they were staying. The four men were forced to strip off their shirts. Along with Cesista, they were forced to roll in the mud. The witnesses narrated that they were pleading with state forces to stop their inhumane acts but to no avail,” the NUPL-Cebu Chapter said in a statement.
A photo showing a man with his hands bound behind his back circulated on social media shortly after the encounter was announced by the military. The man was identified by the CPP as Compoc alias “Silong,” the head of the remnants of the BPC.
Marco Valbuena, chief information officer of CPP, said the photo of Compoc proved that he was captured alive by the military.
“Compoc, who was in his 60s, was suffering from arthritis and was in no position to fight. He was subjected to severe torture in front of a number of people in the village in the hope of striking fear among them. Based on facts initially gathered in the area, Ka Silong was hacked to death, suffering fatal wounds on his neck and abdomen,” Valbuena said.
“Cesista, on the other hand, a young lawyer from Cebu, who chose to serve the peasant masses and their revolutionary movement in Bohol, was thrown to the ground by the soldiers and made to lie and crawl on the mud, before she was eventually shot to death,” he added.
The AFP could not immediately confirm the veracity of the photo, or whether the man was actually Compoc.
However, Lt. Gen. Benedict Arevalo, commander of the Visayas Command (VISCOM), said that the claims of the CPP-NPA of torture and murder were already a “recycled statement.”
“That’s the usual claim. There is nothing new. We are not hearing anything new from what they are saying. They’ve been saying that in all the operations that we have,” he pointed out.