SAN SIMON, Pampanga—Until shortly before her death after a heart attack on Tuesday, the last remaining female commander of the World War II guerrilla group Hukbo ng Bayan Laban sa Hapon (Hukbalahap) had been keeping herself busy with serving her former comrades.
Simeona Punsalan, known in the Hukbalahap as Commander Guerrero, died on the eve of her 93rd birthday and her body is at the family house in Barangay San Miguel here.
Punsalan continued serving the Hukbalahap, a guerrilla group formed to fight the Japanese occupation of Central Luzon during World War II, being able to help more than 100 of former Hukbalahap members apply for pension.
Ligaya Tapang, Punsalan’s daughter, said her mother endorsed the applications of more than 100 Huk veterans from Pampanga and Bulacan by putting her thumb mark on documents submitted to the Military Service Board (MSB).
UNTIL her last days, Simeona Punsalan, a Hukbalahap commander, helped fellow Huk veterans claim pension. TONETTE T. OREJAS/INQUIRER CENTRAL LUZON
The MSB approved 474 pension applications before it was dissolved on May 17, according to a check made by the Inquirer.
Punsalan and the late Remedios Gomez-Paraiso, alias Commander Liwayway, chief of the military provision division of the Hukbalahap in Central Luzon, helped the late Huk leader Luis Taruc claim pensions for Huk veterans after World War II.
Punsalan had asked local officials to look after the welfare of Huk veterans.
In a program recognizing her patriotism and nationalism last year, she appealed to the government to give these veterans attention.
In June 2014, she worked to have the Philippine Veterans Affairs Office (PVAO) restore her pension that stopped arriving in March that year due to an error in record keeping. PVAO gave her pension back after it corrected her status from “deceased” to “alive.”
PVAO records showed that Punsalan organized for the Katipunang Pambansa ng mga Magsasaka sa Pilipinas before World War II. Tonette Orejas, Inquirer Central Luzon