Jose Lava

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Jose "Peping" Lava was the secretary general of the old Communist Party of the Philippines between 1948-1950 when arrested. He spent the following 20 years in prison and later 20 years in exile in Prague.

Politburo member and brother to communist leader Jesus Lava, Jose - known as Peping or Harry - was also the chief of the Communist Party's finance committee. In the mid-1940s, Lava became one of the leaders of the Communist Party.

Jose became general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines in May 1948 after his brother Vicente Lava died. Another brother, Jesus Lava, took over after Jose's arrest in 1950.

In 1948, the PKP began a violent insurrection against the government. The party was banned that year. In early 1950, the PKP created the People's Liberation Army (Hukbong Mapagpalaya ng Bayan), which was made up of about 10,000 soldiers. On 18 Oct. 1950, the entire secretariat of the Central Committee of the PKP was arrested, including General Secretary Jose Lava, following the earlier capture of the Politburo in Manila.

In May 1951 Jose Lava was sentenced to life imprisonment. He was released from prison in January 1970. After that, he left the Philippines to exile himself in Prague. He lived in Czechoslovakia for 20 years till 1990. He has written works on the Communist movement in the Philippines there.

After the fall of communism in Czechoslovakia in 1989, Jose Lava returned to the Philippines in 1990 and died there in 2000.

External links[]

• Photo of Jose Lava