Kerima Lorena Tariman

Kerima Lorena Tariman

By Katrina Stuart Santiago

For those of us who know Kerima, whose work spoke to us in college, whose voice is real, and personal, and complex, hers is a life not wasted, and neither is the revolution she fought for futile.

Duterte’s military frames her death as such. What it forgets is that while not all of us might make the decisions that Kerima had made, while not all of us have the courage or humility to do the same, we are of a generation that knows of the revolution’s value, we know of why it is a valid option, we know of why it exists in the countryside, and across the world. We know that it is NOT terrorism, no matter how institutions frame it as such. We know, as our University education has taught us, as Marcos’s Martial Law has shown us, as the past five years under Duterte has revealed, that if we are to speak of terror we should be looking at the State, more than we should at movements that bear arms to fight against it.

The revolution is not futile. It is necessary. And Kerima’s life is not wasted, not on the revolution she believed in, and certainly not in this fact: her life is an important reminder for our generation that there is so much work that needs to be done, that we might not carry arms, or die in the countryside, but we are as burdened with the same questions that brought Kerima there. Our mission is the same as hers, our vision the same as hers.

We might use different maps to guide us, but we’ve always moved in the same direction of revolution.

(Facebook post)