By Coni Ledesma NDFP Negotiating Panel Member and MAKIBAKA International Representative
This special issue of Liberation International is dedicated to the life and legacy of my beloved husband and comrade, Louie Jalandoni: a revolutionary whose heart beat with the struggles of the Filipino people until his final breath.
To write these words is both an honor and a deeply personal act of remembering him. Louie was more than a life partner to me; he was my comrade-in-arms, my co-dreamer, and a pillar of strength in the long and difficult struggle for national liberation and genuine democracy in the Philippines. For decades, we shared the battlefield of the revolution, sometimes with words, sometimes in silence and in exile, but always with love for the people and for each other. We shared a life of more than 52 years in life and in struggle.
I extend my heartfelt gratitude to the dedicated staff of the NDFP International Office and the staff of Liberation International for making this special tribute issue possible. It is especially meaningful, as it was Louie himself who began the important work of writing articles to update solidarity allies, parties, and governments on the advances and challenges of the Philippine revolutionary movement. He was the first editor of Philippine Updates and later helped initiate Liberation International together with the late NDFP chairperson Antonio “Manong” Zumel as a platform to deepen international solidarity and raise the banner of the Filipino people’s struggle abroad.
This issue brings together powerful tribute statements that capture facets of Louie’s life and legacy as a revolutionary, a diplomat, a negotiator and servant of the people. We hope that reading through these tributes will help readers paint a vivid and enduring portrait of a life lived in the service of the Filipino masses and the struggle for national and social liberation.
In honoring Ka Louie, we are reminded that revolutionaries do not die. They live on in the victories of the people, in the songs of the youth, in the deepened commitment of those who remain. Louie’s legacy lives on in every barrio resisting militarization, in every worker demanding just wages, in every migrant organizing for their rights, and in every comrade who dares to dream and struggle for a better world.#