Victor notes the simple reason why the CPP targets the
recruitment of young Filipinos: because they have more
capacity for ideological formation and organizing. The education
that university – and recently, senior high school – students
have primed them for the CPP’s ideological brainwashing.
“It is very hard for the CPP to develop cadres from peasants,
from workers because it will take 5 to 10 years. For the youth
and students, it will only take 2 to 3 years and the CPP will have
a cadre. That is the reason why the youth, student, and labor
movements are critical to the recovery of Red Areas,” Victor
said.
The youth, he said, serves as the CPP’s main mobilizers,
recruiters, and propagandists. That is why it was important
for the CPP to infiltrate universities – rich sources of young,
susceptible minds looking for community, knowledge, and open
to new ideas – and shape them into effective mouthpieces. Aside
from their thirst for knowledge, it was relatively easy for the
CPP to convince young recruits to go full-time in the communist
organization because they were untethered from the burdens of
raising a family. This strategy of the CPP-NPA-NDF – to recruit
and influence the youth – continues even to this day, as shown
by the Senate hearing on August 7, 2019 and by parents like Ms.
Relissa Lucena and many others.
“When you have a strong youth and student movement,
and when you sustain the urban mass movement, you can infuse
cadres, organizers, propagandists, and mobilizers to the Red
Area to recover, to strengthen, and to reactivate areas left by the
NPA. This is one reason why schools are primarily targeted for
infiltration by the CPP. The youth and student sector is a good
recruitment pool for the armed struggle, which the NPA is the
primary beneficiary,” Victor added.
--THE WARS WITHIN (2020/ Copy&Share)
