NPA leader to register, become mayor in jail if court will not free him

MALIBCONG, Abra– This province’s top communist party leader Jovencio Balweg Sr. will register as voter with the Commission on Elections next week, may win as mayor here in his hometown next year, but may administer his functions from his prison cell.

This, in time for a hearing on his murder and frustrated murder cases including his rebellion raps before the Regional Trial Court Branch 2 in this capital town.

Human rights lawyer Reynaldo Cortes of the Free Legal Assistance Group bared this to newsmen saying Balweg had been in detention at Camp Crame since his capture on June 19 in Baguio City.

For the past four decades, Balweg Sr. has been a New People’s Army leader in Abra rising from the ranks to become a member of the executive committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines’ Ilocos-Cordillera Regional Party Committee.

He will register for the first time as a voter in Malibcong. But he will not go to his hometown, as the local Comelec officer will go to him to have his biometrics.

Balweg Sr., whose wife Carmen and namesake son-Jovencio Jr. and wife also surrendered to authorities after the elder Balweg’s arrest.

Now, the elder Balweg is reportedly eying politics telling reporters he is not thinking of going back to the mountains anymore to rejoin his comrades as he is also suffering from illnesses.

Balweg Sr.’s candidacy for the topmost position in his hometown is reportedly being supported by many sectors.

A high ranking police official who requested anonymity said Balweg would make a good leader.

Former colleague in the CPP-NPA, now mayor of Lacub – Cesar Barona also said Balweg Sr. will win next year should he decide to run.

If Balweg Sr. runs, nobody would repotredly contest him in the race because of his popularity in his hometown.

In the province, like Barona, former NPA leaders who ran for elective posts never lost against their opponents.

Barona’s brother Leo, also a former NPA commander became mayor of Lacub town in the late 80’s.

The exception was Balweg Sr.’s own brother Conrado, a former SVD priest-turned rebel in the 70s, who ran but lost in the congressional race in the early 90s.

According to Cortes, the irony is Balweg Sr.will be serving as a mayor in jail if the court will not free him before he wins in the May 2010 polls.

Balweg Sr. petitioned the court to drop murder and frustrated murder raps lodged against him in connection with the Dec. 31, 1999 murder of his brother.

Cortes said this was “because the crime is absolved in the rebellion raps.”

Abra NPAs had claimed responsibility in the killing if former rebel-priest Conrado Balweg in 1999 for his alleged “blood debts” while leading the CPLA.

Jovencio was with the NPA at that time.