Ladybhem P.

Sialongo

Philippine Revolution

What was being taught in the schools starting from the primary up to the tertiary level

about the Philippine Revolution was mostly focused in Luzon area where in fact it was called as

Philippine Revolution. The common question was, how about those other parts of the country

the provinces outside Metro Manila and the areas far from the focal point like Visayas and

Mindanao. Did those areas participated the revolution? How did they accept the revolution?

And what was their participation during the revolution?

In the account of Filomeno Bautista on The Bautista “Manuscript on the Philippine

Revolution in Misamis Province, 1900-1901”, the Philippine Revolution on 1896 did not

participated by the people of the Misamis except of those deserter’s reports of the troops

assigned in Iligan. The people of Cagayan de Oro remained loyal to the Spanish government

until the intervention of the Americans in 1898. People of Cagayan de Oro lost their trust to the

Spanish Government upon knowing the real standing of the Spaniards with the war against the

Americans. They realized that Spaniards were weak and can be easily defeated and the people

were now thinking of the idea of freedom and liberation. Upon the coming of the American

troops in Cagayan de Oro they were faced by strong resistance under such notable leaders in

the lead of Gen. Capistrano.

Ruben Canoy in his book History of Mindanao in the chapter entitled “Farewell to

Mindanao End of Spanish Regime” he wrote about the attempts in convincing the moro people

to join in the revolution by the Katipunan leaders. This action was intended to strengthen the

revolution but the moro leaders/sultan rejected the idea. Their sentiment was that as these
tagalogs declared to fight the Spaniards they were already doing it for three centuries so whats

the point of helping the tagalog.

The book of Ileto, R.C, entitled Filipinos and their Revolution Events, Discourse and

Historiography discussed the rural life in a time of revolution. The book reveals on how did the

people in the neighboring town of Manila especially the rural areas respond to the idea of

revolution. Accordingly the people who belong to principalia in Tianong did not participate

immediately the 1896 revolution for the reasons that they had more to lose if disorder were to

prevail. These incidents include robberies, kidnapping for ransom, thefts of cattle and harvest,

disruption of their children schooling and the loss of their privileges as allies of Spain.

Leonard Y. Andaya wrote Ethnicity in the Philippine Revolution and defined the

revolution as the Tagalog revolution according to the non-Tagalog. That the said uprising was a

moved of the Tagalog’s to overthrown the Spanish government and dominate the ethno

linguistic groups in the Philippines. Gradually the revolution was embraced by all the people

and the term Tagalogness was equated to Filipinoness. The Spaniards was very successful in

their campaign of the divide and rule policy which became also the hindering factor of the

revolution. It was accounted that 50-80% of the Spanish forces or the guardia civil were Indios.

Rizal was aware of this problem and aimed to overcome these barriers of ethno linguistic

identity that had been advanced by the religious orders and believed of the unity of all Indios.

Amado Guerrero wrote on his book Philippine Society and Revolution cited the phases

of Philippine Revolution starting from the 1896 Revolution up until the insurgency era of the

Philippines. Guerrero pointed out that starting from the very first revolution the cause was the

abuses of the powerful aristocrats towards the weak. And most of the exploited one was the

people who belong to the masses. The unequal treatment between the elite class in the society

and the proletariat class leads the idea towards a classless society.