Margaret Flowers of Popular Resistance interviews Rhonda Ramiro of Bayan USA for “Clearing the Fog” Podcast, May 15, 2023
Leaders of the G7 countries, the United States and its Western Imperialist partners plus Japan, will meet this week in Hiroshima to discuss ways to escalate the war on China. As they lead us closer to global and potentially nuclear war, the significance of the location is offensive to people’s movements. Clearing the FOG speaks with Rhonda Ramiro, the spokesperson for BAYAN-USA and a leader of the US chapter of the International League of People’s Struggle, about protests being planned against the G7 Summit and how people can participate virtually. She also discusses campaigns in the US against state repression and major actions being planned to protest the Asian-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in San Francisco this November.
Rhonda Ramiro has been an activist in the ND movement since the 1990s. She was a founding member of Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines-San Francisco in 1999, for which she was the chair until 2003. After taking a short break to have her first child in 2003, she went on to serve as the Secretary of the National Organizing Committee of BAYAN-USA in 2004-5 and then to be a founding member of AnakBayan East Bay in 2007. In 2008, Rhonda was elected to be the BAYAN-USA Regional Coordinator for Northern California, helped re-start efforts to build the International League of Peoples’ Struggle in Northern California, and helped coordinate the Northern California delegation to the ILPS Third International Assembly. Rhonda served as Secretary General of BAYAN-USA from 2009-2012, Vice Chair 2012-2018, and Chairperson 2018 – 2023. She now serves as a spokesperson. Rhonda is currently the Chair of the US Chapter of the International League of People’s Struggle.
Rhonda’s favorite activities are writing sound bites and hit pieces that expose the evils of US imperialism, making presentations on the shared history and struggles of third world people, doing media interviews about the Philippines and the ND movement, listening to her partner play the guitar, and cooking up new recipes and science projects with her kids.