9ID enlists former NPA rebel

From the Philippine News Agency (Dec 15): 9ID enlists former NPA rebel

Lamberto “Nonoy” Niebla, a former New People’s Army (NPA) rebel, took his oath on Friday as a new member of the Philippine Army's 9th Infantry (Spear) Division, the organization he fought for almost 10 years. Army Maj. Angelo Guzman, 9th ID spokesperson said Niebla, is among the 94 new soldiers of the division that finished the five-month Candidate Soldier Course class 300-12. Niebla was a former active NPA member operating in the island province of Catanduanes. He was 16 years old when he joined the communist movement, Guzman said.

Niebla was trained by the rebel group to become a "propagandist" and recruiter for the NPA before he voluntarily surrendered to the 83rd Infantry Battalion of the 9th Infantry Division. “I was made to believe about the barbaric acts of the soldiers. They are really very good in giving beautiful and inspiring messages. I was young then, and I was easily influenced,” he said. Niebla said that his negative views about the soldiers changed when he met and befriended a soldier. “The soldiers are not the violent people I was made to believe,” he said.

As a newly enlisted soldier now of the 9th ID, Niebla wants to help others who were misled like him. “I want to help in countering the recruitment of the rebels of students and young teenagers,” Niebla said. He wants to be an example for those who are still in the rebel organization that there is still hope of a better life if they join the mainstream of society.

http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=2&sid=&nid=2&rid=480159