José Lava

José Baltazar Lava, also known as Peping or Harry,^[1] was the general secretary of the Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas-1930 (PKP), from 1948 until his arrest in 1950. He spent the following two decades in prison and another two decades in exile in Prague, Czechoslovakia.

José Baltazar Lava
General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Philippines
In office May 1948 – February 1951
Preceded by	Jorge Frianeza
Succeeded by	Jesus Lava
Personal details
Born	1912 Philippine Islands
Died	2000(2000-00-00) (aged 87–88)
Political party	Communist Party of the Philippines
Children	Aida Lava Dizon
Relatives	Vicente Jesus
Alma mater	University of the Philippines

Early life and political career

Lava was born in 1912 to a moderately affluent landowning family of six brothers and three sisters in Bulacan.^{[1]: 87 [2]} He obtained a degree in accounting at the University of the Philippines School of Business after graduating high school in 1929. He then went to the University of the Philippines College of Law in 1933 and graduated in 1937.^[1]: 95 He became a Communist Party member right after passing the bar late in 1937.^[1]: 95

Lava became general secretary of the Central Committee of the PKP in May 1948, shortly after his brother Vicente Lava died in 1947.^[3]: 4 Lava was previously a politburo member and the chief of the party's finance committee.

The PKP began a violent insurrection against the government in 1948 and was banned by the government the same year. In early 1950, the PKP established the People's Liberation Army (Hukbong Mapagpalaya ng Bayan), which was made up of about 10,000 soldiers. The entire secretariat of the Central Committee of the PKP, including Lava, was arrested on October 18, 1950, following the earlier capture of the politburo in Manila. Lava was succeeded by his other brother Jesus Lava in February 1951.

Lava was sentenced to life imprisonment in May 1951. He was released from prison on 4 January 1970 and fled to Prague, Czechoslovakia.^[1]: 108 While living in self-imposed exile, he authored several books on the communist movement in the Philippines.

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

References

1. Dalisay Jr., Jose (1998). "The Lava Brothers: Blood and Politics" (PDF). Public Policy. 2 (3): 87–112.
2. Dalisay, Jose Y. (1999). The Lavas: A Filipino Family. Published and exclusively distributed by Anvil Pub. p. 4. ISBN 978-971-27-0822-0.
3. Fuller, Ken (2011). A Movement Divided: Philippine Communism, 1957-1986. University of the Philippines Press. ISBN 978-971-542-662-6.