Long live the legacy of Ka Bel!

Workers World Party sends our deepest condolences to the family, friends and comrades of the great Filipino labor leader and freedom fighter, Crispin Beltran, lovingly known as Ka Bel.

Dianne Mathiowetz, Ka Bel and Teresa Gutierrez.

We received with great sadness the news that Ka Bel had died on May 20th after a long and fruitful life.

Comrades of our party had occasion in 2006 to meet with and visit Ka Bel in the hospital where he was being held as a political prisoner at the time. Our comrades reported that it was a real honor to meet him and were deeply and greatly moved by his tremendous knowledge, his deep understanding of Marxism and his revolutionary optimism. He was full of joy, but most important, full of love for the struggle of his people. And he was deeply concerned as well with the worldwide struggle against imperialism.

Despite years of imprisonment, repression and torture, Ka Bel was fiercely determined to struggle on. He had the utmost confidence that one day the Filipino people would be victorious.

The name Ka Bel is, unfortunately, not well known in the U.S., because the struggle of the Filipino people for their liberation is hidden from the pages of the bourgeois press. But it is a glorious and rich struggle, one that Ka Bel symbolized so well. As was so aptly put, “Ka Bel was a legend in his own time.”

Let us take advantage of the death of this great revolutionary leader to build the movement in solidarity with the Filipino people. A special appeal should be made to the youth of this country, the U.S., so they may learn the history of Ka Bel and build on his legacy. Ka Bel was a revolutionary, a communist who dedicated his entire life to the liberation of his people, and his work should be known by all. His example should be studied and followed by people around the world, by anyone struggling against the yoke of imperialism.

Our party is confident that the struggle Ka Bel dedicated his life to will be victorious. The Filipino people will be free. They will one day build a new society and the name of Ka Bel will ring proudly through his land.

Long live the Legacy of Ka Bel!
U.S. imperialism out of the Philippines!
Victory to the Filipino people!
Long live international solidarity! From the National Committee of Workers World Party