01/10/2026
[ RIYAH JAZER RIO ]
An Open Letter to My Son Jazer Rio Luneta Murillo , About Your Lolo Romeo Luneta
Anak,
You asked me before, "Mama, who was my Lolo Romy?"
I smiled with tears in my eyes, because how do I even begin to tell you about my Ama?
Your Lolo Romy was just a young student in Southern Tagalog in 1964, but he already had the heart of a giant. He gave his entire youth to a dream a just and humane society to awakening, organizing, and mobilizing the youth who had no voice.
Because he loved the people so much, he was hunted. He was watched, arrested, tortured, and thrown in jail for years in Camp Vicente Lim under Martial Law. They didn't just want him they wanted his brother Jose. But your Lolo never broke. Even in pain, even in a dark cell, he never feared the enemy.
He came from a family of brave souls, anak. Seven of them, brothers and sisters, all chose to serve the people. Your Lolo once traced it back and told me our Luneta bloodline has always fought, first against the Spaniards, then the Americans. Fighting for what is right is in our blood, and now, it is in yours too.
When he was freed because they found nothing against him, he didn't run away. He fought again. This time for human rights, for those who disappeared, for those who were silenced. Through KAPATID ng DESAPARECIDOS, and SELDA first in Manila, then as the voice of SELDA in Southern Tagalog he stood for others until his last breath. Even when diabetes made his body weak, his spirit never weakened, until his heart finally gave in to cardiac arrest.
Anak, the people remember him as Kasamang Romy.
But I remember him as Ama.
I remember his hands, rough from struggle but so gentle when he held me. I remember that even when the whole nation needed him, when I had to share him with the bayan "kahati ko ang bayan" he made sure I, his bunso, his baby girl, never felt that I was second.
He taught me what it truly means to serve the people. To be one with them. To love the country not just in words, but with your whole life mahalin ang bayan.That is the lesson he left me, and that is the lesson I now pass on to you.
He would come home tired from organizing, from marching, from meetings, but he still had time to ask about my day, to hug me, to make me feel that I was his whole world. That is the kind of father he was, anak. His love for the people never took away his love for us. It made it bigger.
So when you ask who your Lolo is, anak, he is courage. He is compassion. He is proof that you can love your country deeply and still love your family completely.
I may have had to share your Lolo with the world, but his love? Anak, I felt it fully. And now I give that same love to you.
Your Lolo lives on, anak in the struggle he fought for, and in you.
I love you, and I am so proud that you carry his blood.
Mabuhay ang Ama ko, ang Lolo Romy mo.
Mama