"May God have mercy on his soul."
This was the short and cold remark Vice President Sara Duterte issued on Saturday, December 17 following the report of the passing of Jose Maria 'Joma' Sison, the founder of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).
Earlier, the CPP confirmed in a statement that Sison, 83, died after two weeks of confinement in a hospital located in Utrecht, The Netherlands, at around 8:40 PM (Philippine time) on December 16.
He has founded CPP on december 26, 1968. However, Sison has lived in self-imposed exile in Europe ever since peace talks with the government bogged down in 1987.
Before her stint as the Vice President, the then-Davao City Mayor Duterte had deplored communist terrorists, sharing the same stance with her father, former President Rodrigo Duterte.
Duterte terminated the peace talks with the CPP and the New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) in protest of atrocities committed against government forces and civilians.
