SIMON LI TUANQUI

THE ENDURING LEGACY OF SIMON LI TUANQUI

The earliest known Chinese Catholic identified by name in Bicol history is Simon Li Tuanqui. A pure Chinese, he was described by the 19^th century scholarly Dominican Bishop Francisco Gainza as “an cristianong inchic.” Although he is now most known for donating the now equally well-known pair of “Li Tuanqui Bells” to the Peñafrancia Shrine in Nueva Caceres in 1863 and 1868, he shared more than mere bells during his lifetime. From Nueva Caceres (now Naga City), he later took permanent residence in Polangui, Albay due to his marriage to local lass Maria Sarte, and thus became a parishioner and benefactor of the Sts. Peter and Paul Parish. His extended family in Polangui donated a portion of land to this Parish. The lot is located behind the Church.

Li Tuanqui’s life as a devotee and philanthropist to the Peñafrancia Shrine is documented by Bishop Gainza, the 25^th Spanish prelate in the See of Caceres, in the annex to his Bikol account of the history of the Virgin of Peñafrancia, which was translated to English by Jose Barrameda Jr. According to verbal accounts obtained by Barrameda from people who heard descriptions of Li Tuanqui from earlier descendants who either saw Simon or his pictures, which are now non-existent, or heard of the descriptions passed on from much older people, Li Tuanqui wore his hair in the traditional Mandarin Chinese pigtail.

In his early 40’s, Li Tuanqui was baptized by Bishop Gainza himself, and given the Christian name Simon, after Simon Vela, the French Marian devotee who, out of divine guidance, found the original image of the miraculous Lady in Peña de Francia, Spain in 1534.

In 1863, when Bishop Gainza started renovations on the Peñafrancia Shrine, Simon donated the major portion of the funds for the belfry. In addition, he gave the first of two “Li Tuanqui Bells.” He donated the second, identical bell in 1868. They are said to have been cast in Binondo, Manila.

In 1994, Barrameda inspected the man-sized bells to see for himself the inscriptions thereat. On the first bell were indeed inscribed the words: “PARA SA IGLESIA DE NTRA. SRA. DE PEÑAFRANCIA ANO D. 1863 SIMON LI TOANGOUI” and some Chinese ideographs. On the second bell were etched the words: “OBSEQUIO DE SIMON LI TUANQUI A NTRA. SRA. DE PEÑAFRANCIA ANO. 1868.” [Note how the spelling of the name evolved, which is characteristic of Chinese surnames.]

In 1997, the “Li Tuanqui Bells” created a stir, when the Filipino-Chinese Centennial Movement headed by anti-crime crusader Teresita Ang-See formally requested for the donation of the antique bells to the organization, in exchange for replica bells, so that they could showcase Chinese influence and contribution to Philippine culture and history at the Kaisa Heritage Center, a museum in Intramuros, Manila during the country’s centenary celebrations. Msgr. Leonardo Legazpi, Archbishop of Caceres, had acceded to the request but parishioners and other sectors including local media opposed, so the bells remained where they presently are.

Li Tuanqui’s generosity led to his good standing with the Church hierarchy. He is the only Chinese mentioned by name in Bishop Gainza’s writings. He wielded influence among the local Chinese as a successful trader. His wealth included real estate in the heart of downtown Naga. With his stature, he spearheaded the local Chinese community in financing the building of the first Pagoda, the water vessel now called “Sakay”, used in the annual procession of the Ina in the Naga River.

Li Tuanqui had four children by Maria Sarte. His only son Rufino became mayor of Polangui, and then a provincial board member, and finally a governor in 1916. Among his present-day descendants are Marcial Estevez Tuanqui—former vice governor of Albay and past president of Albay Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Fr. Eleuterio Espinas—former ambassador to Canada and the Netherlands, Clementina Natividad, Manuel Tuanqui, Tomas Tuanqui, Glicerio Tuanqui, Godofredo Tuanqui, Dr. Ramon T. Caceres, Dr. Arnel T. Borja, Vicente T. Natividad, Rudy Tuanqui, Marcial Tuanqui IV and Michael Tuanqui.

Li Tuanqui lived a tranquil and upright life in Polangui, where he passed on to his extended Filipino family a tradition of special love for the Ina. In fact, his descendants led by Marcial E. Tuanqui, inspired by the deeds of their illustrious forebear, donated a substantial amount to the Peñafrancia Shrine in 1996 for the renovation of the wooden belfry into concrete. The Li Tuanqui descendants again donated in 2014, this time to the Sts. Peter and Paul Parish in Polangui, Albay, a generous amount for the construction of the QuadriCentennial-Pearl Arch, a grand main gate to serve as memento of the Parish’s 430^th milestone anniversary.

Simon Li Tuanqui died in 1896. But even after the passage of 118 years, he lives on in the annual Peñafrancia phenomenon, in his descendants who find it worthy to emulate his unselfish deeds, and in the two Li Tuanqui Bells, which continue to peal to the faithful every single day, to this very day, for more than 151 years now… and will continue to do so for a long, long time.   Absalom Penilla/Bicol Biographies

JESSE ROBREDO

 

Jesse Manalastas Robredo (May 27, 1958 – August 18, 2012) was a 2000 Ramon Magsaysay Awardee for Government Service, a Filipino statesman who served as Secretary of the Interior and Local Government in the administration of President Benigno Aquino III from 2010 to until his death in 2012.

 

Beginning in 1988, Robredo served six terms as Mayor of Naga City in Camarines Sur. In recognition of his achievements as Naga City mayor, Robredo was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Government Service in 2000, the first Filipino mayor so honored. He was appointed to the Cabinet of President Aquino in July 2010. Robredo was a member of the Liberal Party.

 

On August 18, 2012, the Piper PA-34-200 Seneca I aircraft carrying Secretary Robredo crashed off the shore of Masbate Island. He was scheduled to go home and watch his daughter's swimming competition in Naga City. The Philippine Department of Interior and Local Government said that the pilot sent a distress call to the Masbate airport requesting an emergency landing. The airplane never made it to the airport and crashed in the sea. Robredo's body was retrieved three days later, August 21, 800 meters from the shore and 180 feet below sea level.

 

Early life

 

Jesse and family. Thanks to sankieblogger.

Jesse Manalastas-Robredo was born on May 27, 1958 in Naga City to Jose Chan-Robredo, Sr. (1923–) and Marcelina Manalastas-Robredo (1927–). He was the third of siblings: he had a brother, Jose "Butch" Robredo Jr., a businessman; and three sisters: Dr. Jocelyn Robredo-Austria, who lives in the USA; Jenny Robredo-Tang; and Penny Robredo-Bundoc.

 

Personal life

 

He was married to lawyer Maria Leonor Gerona Robredo with three daughters; Jessica Marie (Aika), Janine Patricia (Tricia), and Jillian Therese (Jill).

 

Education

 

He studied at Naga Parochial School, a private Catholic school where he began to hone his talent and love for chess. The school was known and had established a record for winning Bicol's annual provincewide chess tournament and Robredo's brother had been among its champions. However, when it was Robredo's turn to represent his school, he only garnered second place.

Robredo entered high school at Ateneo de Naga University in 1970 and was in junior year when

President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in September 1972. The university administration immediately called an assembly and warned its students against getting involved in anti-government activities – which could result in the school being closed down.

Robredo obtained his undergraduate degrees in Industrial Management Engineering and Mechanical Engineering at De La Salle University. He was later accepted as an Edward Mason Fellow and graduated with a Masters of Public Administration degree from Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government in 1999. In 1985, Robredo finished his Master’s in Business Administration at the University of the Philippines Diliman, Quezon City, as a scholar and was named the Graduate School and Faculty Organization awardee for scholarly excellence.

The Far Eastern University bestowed Robredo with a doctorate in Humanities, honoris causa, during its 80th commencement exercise held at the plenary hall of the Philippine International Convention Center on April 4, 2008, recognizing his efforts to develop Naga City.

 

Career

 

Early career

 

In 1980, Robredo worked for the San Miguel Corporation in Mandaluyong City, in the Physical

Distribution Technical Services of the General Services Division, and within six months, Robredo had hurdled two of the three levels in the division and was then sent to the finance division for another six months. When Robredo's immediate superior transferred to Magnolia Ice Cream, San Miguel Corporation's ice cream division, he was invited to come along. He was assigned to logistics planning and concurrently functioned as staff assistant to the physical distribution director.

In 1986, Robredo returned to Naga City, where he became Program Director of the Bicol River Basin Development Program, an agency tasked to undertake integrated area development planning in the three provinces of the Bicol region.

 

Mayor of Naga City

 

In 1988, Robredo was elected mayor of Naga City at age 29, the youngest mayor in Philippine

history. His three terms as mayor ended on June 30, 1998. He was again elected as City Mayor in 2001 and finished his second three terms on June 30, 2010.

He served for a total of nineteen (19) years as Naga City Mayor before being appointed on July 9, 2010 as Secretary of the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG). Robredo was able to transform Naga City from being dull and lethargic to being one of the "Most Improved Cities in Asia," as cited by Asiaweek Magazine in 1999.

During his time in city hall, Robredo was credited for "dramatically improved stakeholdership and people participation in governance, in the process restoring Naga to its preeminent position as the premier city of Bicol Region."

In 1995, in recognition of his skills and competence as a leader and development manager, Robredo was elected President of the League of Cities of the Philippines, the national association of city mayors. Robredo also chairs the Metro Naga Development Council." He served as chairman of the Regional Development Council, the regional planning and coordinative body

of Bicol's six provinces and seven cities, from 1992 to 1998.

 

Secretary of Interior and Local Government

 

Benigno Aquino III was Secretary of Interior and Local Government, until Aquino named Robredo to succeed him. At least two politicians from Bicol, Luis Ortega and Luis Villafuerte, Sr. expressed opposition to Robredo's confirmation by the Commission on Appointments of which Villafuerte himself was a member.

In March 2012, the Commission on Appointments bypassed Robredo's nomination.

His nomination was bypassed again in June 2012. Another confirmation hearing had reportedly been set on August 29, 2012, eleven days after Robredo's sudden death.

 

Death

 



Marker at Robredo crash site. Thanks to Bicol Mail.

On August 18, 2012, he boarded a Piper PA-34 Seneca in Cebu City to fly to Naga City, however the airplane's pilots decided to make an emergency landing at the Moises R. Espinosa Airport in Masbate City due to engine failure. The aircraft carrying Secretary Robredo along with his aide, Police Chief Inspector June Paolo Abrazado crashed off the shore of Masbate Island. His aide survived the crash. Search and recovery operations were conducted by Philippine Coast Guard/ Philippine Coast Guard Auxiliary, Philippine Navy, Philippine Air Force and the local government of Masbate, with assistance from a number of foreign technical divers.

Robredo's body was found at 8:15 am, Tuesday, August 21, 2012 (PHT). The news was confirmed by DOTC Secretary Mar Roxas. He said the body was found 800 meters (2,600 feet) off Masbate at 54 metres (177 feet) deep.
 

 

State Funeral

 

His funeral was held at the Archbishop's Palace in Naga City before it was transferred to Malacañang Palace for an official wake on August 24, 2012. His remains were later brought back to his hometown of Naga in the early hours of August 26. He was cremated on Tuesday, August 28, 2012.

Philippine President Aquino conferred the Philippine Legion of Honor with the rank of Chief

Commander upon Robredo on August 28, 2012 just before the state funeral.

 

Honours and awards

◾ Dangal ng Bayan Award by the Civil Service Commission (Philippines), 1990

◾ Ramon Magsaysay Award, 2000

◾ Philippine Legion of Honor, Chief Commander (posthumous), 2012

◾ Presidential Lingkod Bayan Award (posthumous) by the Civil Service Commission (Philippines),

2012

◾ Quezon Service Cross (posthumous), 2012

 

References

 

 

1. ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Robredo

LOIDA NICOLAS-LEWIS

Businesswoman, philanthropist, civic leader, motivational speaker, author and lawyer

 

Born 1942 (age 71–72)
Sorsogon City, Sorsogon, Philippines

 

Loida Nicolas-Lewis is a Filipino-born American businesswoman, who is the widow of TLC Beatrice International Holdings Inc. founder, first chairman and CEO, the African-American Wall Street financier Reginald F. Lewis. TLC Beatrice, a $2 billion multinational food company that did all of its business overseas, was widely known as the US's largest black-owned business.

 

Business interests

 

After the death of her husband Reginald from brain cancer in 1993, Loida assumed the leadership of the business. She became the Chair and CEO of TLC Beatrice from 1994 to 2000. She had some success in the company’s growth, achieving a 35% return to investors at the time she liquidated the business in the year 2000. The company’s major investments and operations were spread across Europe. In Asia, TLC Beatrice China operated retail convenience stores in four major cities in China and TLC Beatrice Foods Philippines operated a meat processing plant in Naga City.

 

In the Philippines she established the family-run Lewis College in Sorsogon. She also funded part of a micro finance project in Sorsogon called PALFSI (People’s Alternative Livelihood Foundation of Sorsogon, Inc.) and chairs the Business for Integrity and Stability of our Nation Foundation, Inc. (Bisyon 2020).

 

In July 2012, China’s state-controlled media hit Lewis and called on the Chinese people to boycott a chain of “Beatrice” convenience stores in four Chinese cities (Xiamen, Chengdu, Suzhou and Guangzhou) after she held a press conference in Manila earlier and announced a worldwide campaign to “Boycott Made in China Products”, as a way of matching China’s diplomatic and military arrogance in claiming ownership of the Scarborough Shoal and the Kalayaan Group of Islands in the West Philippine Sea. Fortunately she had already sold her ownership interest in the “Beatrice” stores – at a substantial discount – several years ago to former Chinese business partners. Hence Chinese authorities were urging a boycott of Chinese wholly-owned businesses.

 

Earlier that year, in May, Lewis led about 75 Filipino-Americans and US Pinoys for Good Governance (USP4GG) who marched to the Chinese Consulate on 42nd Street and 12th Avenue to protest Chinese incursions into Philippine territory. She chairs the New York-based USP4GG.

 

Legal work

 

Lewis earned a law degree from the University of the Philippines College of Law in 1960, and was admitted to the Philippine Bar in 1968.

She is the first Asian American to pass the American Bar (in 1974) without having been educated in the United States.

She worked for the Law Students Civil Right Research Council in New York in 1969, Manhattan Legal Services from 1970-3, and as an attorney for the Immigration and Naturalization Services from 1979-90.

Early life

Born and raised in Sorsogon City, Philippines. She attended St. Agnes Academy (formerly Academia de Sta. Ines), and graduated cum laude from St. Theresa's College, a private, Roman Catholic women's college in Manila, Philippines (that location has since closed).

 

Personal life

 

Loida Nicolas-Lewis met her husband-to-be Reginald F. Lewis on a blind date in New York in 1968, and married on 16 August 1969 in Manila.

 

Reginald Lewis acquired Beatrice International in December 1987 in a $985 million leveraged buyout, creating the largest African American-owned company in the United States.

 

The family moved to Paris in 1990. Loida Nicolas-Lewis has spoken to audiences around the United States and the world to promote the biography of her late husband, “Why Should White Guys Have All the Fun?: How Reginald Lewis Created a Billion Dollar Business Empire.”

 

She currently resides in New York City.

 

References

 

1.       ^http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loida_Nicolas-Lewis

2.       ^http://www.aboutmyrecovery.com/loida-nicolas-lewis-talks-on-grief

3.       ^http://globalnation.inquirer.net/36639/loida-lewis-to-china

4.       ^http://globalnation.inquirer.net/44732/loida-lewis-is-chinas-newest-public-enemy-no-1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LUDOVICO PADILLA AREJOLA

January 31, 1861 – May 21, 1934

Born in Nueva Caceres (now Naga City)

 

Ludovico and younger brother Tomas took their secondary education at the Seminario Conciliar (now the Holy Rosary Minor Seminary in Naga City) then finished their Bachelor of Arts degrees in San Juan de Letran, Manila. Ludovico finished law but illness forced him to return to Nueva Caceres while Tomas left for Madrid, Spain in August 1888 to continue his law studies at the Universidad Central de Madrid.

 

In 1896 Ludovico was arrested together with his father, Antonio, and at least 77 other Bicolanos in the mass arrests following the discovery of the Katipunan in Manila in August. Tortured and incarcerated, father and son were deported with others to Fernando Poo Island, a Spanish penal colony off the west coast of Africa. Amnestied and released, he and his father made their way back to the Philippines, where Ludovico lost no time in visiting Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo. Initially assigned by Aguinaldo to solicit contributions for the revolution, he was eventually appointed as Coronel de la Milicia Territorial in Ambos Camarines and Catanduanes, tasked to organize the milicianos in the territory.

In January 1900, the Americans landed in Legazpi, south of Nueva Caceres, not so much to end resistance in Bicol, but to open the hemp ports from which flowed the abaca fibers very much in demand in the American market. General Arejola organized a large guerilla army and fought the Americans at Agdangan, Baao town. When additional American troops disembarked in Calabanga on February 19, 1900 as part of their invasion of Bicol, Ludovico was left by General Antonino Guevara, the Magdalo military chief in Camarines, to defend Nueva Caceres while Guevara decamped for Albay.

Outnumbered, outgunned and untrained, Ludovico and his milicianos retreated to the mountains of Minalabac where he brought together the scattered and disbanded troops. The resistance  also included an eight-woman group called the Damas Benemeritas de la Patria that tended to the injured and the sick and brought clothes and provisions to the Bicolano guerillas.

On March10, still holding the rank of colonel, he was acclaimed commander-in-chief of the reorganized army by 10,000 Bicolano partisans in Taban, Minalabac, with Elias Angeles, who had his own troops that had fought in Agdangan, Baao, and Bernabe Dimalibot as his lieutenant colonels with the functions of military chief and chief of staff, respectively.

He set up his general headquarters in Mata, Minalabac. Thereafter, he directed all-out guerrilla warfare all over Camarines Sur against the superior American army. His aged father and other members of the Arejola family (including women, and Tomas who was abroad) joined in the resistance efforts. Despite deprivation, a dearth in arms, illnesses, and an enemy that waged what amounted to a scorched earth policy in the province, Arejola continued to rally his men and refused early offers of peace by the Americans.

On the third offer, on March 25, 1901, accompanied by Ludovico’s brother Fr. Leoncio Arejola, American officers 1Lt. George Curry (11^th Cavalry USV) and 2Lt. George Mosely (9^th Cavalry USV) convinced Ludovico to sign the peace agreement in Taban, Minalabac. On March 31, under the Philippine national flag and with 1 colonel, 3 lieutenant colonels, 5 majors, 21 junior officers, and about 800 men, Brig. Gen. Arejola marched to Nueva Caceres where they were received by the Americans with military honors. They turned over 43 rifles, 12 revolvers and hundreds of bolos.

Civil government was finally established in Ambos Camarines in April 1901.

He declined an offer of governorship of Ambos Camarines by Philippine Commission President William Howard Taft. Later he accepted the post of Clerk of Court of the First Instance in Nueva Caceres. He devoted himself to the welfare of the Bicolano war veterans through the Asociacion de Veteranos de la Revolucion which he headed in Camarines Sur, and continued to advocate for total independence of the Philippines almost to the day of his death.

He had eight children (one son and seven daughters) by his first wife, Teodora Imperial; and a son and a daughter in his second marriage. He died on May 21, 1934 and was interred in the Peñafrancia cemetery in Nueva Caceres.

 

Bibliography:

Barrameda, Jose Jr. V. “The Bicol Martyrs of 1896 Revisited.” Bicol Mail, January 15 & 22, 2008.

Curry, George. George Curry 1861-1947. An Autobiography. H. B. Hening (ed). Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. 1995. (1st ed., 1958)

Gomez, Marcos, OFM. A Friar’s Account of the Philippine Revolution in Bicol. Apolinar Pastrana Riol, OFM (trnsl). Manila: Regal Printing Co. 1980.

Schumacher, John N., S.J. “Filipino Masonry in Madrid, 1889-1896.” Manila: Philippine Historical Review. Vol. 1, No. 2. 1966.

Soriano, Evelyn Caldera. Bicolano Revolutionaries. Manila: National Commission for Culture and the Arts. 1999.

Ursua, Jacinto and Ignacio Meliton. “Martires Bicolanos: Un Episodio de la Revolucion del ’96.” 1943. Typescript.

TOMAS PADILLA AREJOLA

September 18, 1865 - May 22, 1926

 

Tomas Arejola was a Filipino propagandist during the Spanish colonial period, lawyer, legislator, diplomat and a political writer. A mason and a liberal, he openly campaigned for political reforms in the Philippines. During the Commonwealth period, Arejola joined the Nacionalista Party becoming its first vice-president. He was twice elected as Representative of Ambos Camarines [Camarines Sur and Camarines Norte] in the elections of 1907 and 1911.

 

Early life and education

 

Arejola was born in Nueva Caceres (now Naga City) in Ambos Camarines, Philippines. His parents were Antonio Arejola and Emeteria Padilla and he had five siblings: Ludovico, who became a General in the Filipino-American War, Leoncio, who became a priest, Fabiana, Encarnacion and Dolores. Prominent and wealthy, his family possessed large tracts of farmland in the province and raised cattle.

 

Arejola studied Humanities at the Colegio Seminario de Nueva Caceres (1878–1884) and took his Bachelor of Arts at San Juan de Letran. By 1886, he earned a Surveyor's degree at the University of Santo Tomas while also starting a Law course in the same school. He convinced his father to allow him to finish his law in Madrid. He was disgusted with his professors who were favoring the Spanish mestizos in his school. So on August 1886 he sailed for Spain. At the age of 22, year 1888 he finished his course in Law at the Central Universidad de Madrid.

 

Life in Madrid

 

A prolific writer and a brilliant orator, he found common cause with the Filipino propagandists residing in Madrid. José Rizal, Marcelo del Pilar, Lopez Jaena, Juan Luna and many others became his close friends and they all were one in crying out for reforms in the colonial administration of the country. Arejola was bold particularly in writing articles in the more liberal newspapers in Madrid spelling out three demands upon the Spanish colonial authorities: 1) institute political reforms in the administration of the colony, 2) representation of the Philippines to the Spanish Cortes, and 3) conversion of the Philippine as an integral province of Spain.

 

He became a very active member of the Asociacion Hispano Filipino whose president was Prof. Miguel Morayta of Central Universidad de Madrid. He also joined Colonia Organizada de Madrid whose first president was Jose Rizal. When the Asociacion Hispano-Filipino folded up, he organized the Circulo Hispano-Filipino where he became the first president and the secretary was Mariano Ponce.

His articles saw print in España en Filipinas, El Pais, El Progreso, La Vanguardia Filipina, La Correspondencia de España, La Solidaridad—the newspaper put up by the Filipino ilustrados in Spain, Heraldo de Madrid, La Publicidad, La Voz de Ultramar, El Filipino, and Isabelo de los Reyes’ Filipinas Ante Europa, a periodical so unremittingly Filipino that American authorities arrested and jailed Filipinos found in possession of it. In one dispatch to “Filipinas” worthy of the propagandizing genius of a de los Reyes, Tomas wrote about Ludovico and the exploits of the Bicolano soldiers in the Filipino-American War in Camarines.

 

In 1896, at the time he was president of Circulo Hispano-Filipino, the revolution in the colony broke out and he was hauled to prison on suspicion he was connected with the rebellion at home. According to Evelyn Caldera Soriano in her book Bicolano Revolutionaries, Arejola was detained for four days in Carcel Modelo in Madrid together with Jose Oriola and Francisco Colon as reported in La Correspondencia which wrote of the existence of a club of Filipino separatists sympathetic to the Cuban rebels. He was released after no solid evidence was found against him. To cool things off, he went to Lisbon, Portugal. But shortly after, he returned to Madrid where he became the president of the newly organized Filipino Republican Committee which was more militant than the previous organizations he joined.

 

His father Antonio and brother Ludovico were included in the mass arrests after the discovery of the Katipunan in Manila in August 1896. Tortured and incarcerated, they were exiled to Fernando Poo Island, a Spanish penal colony off the west coast of Africa, together with some 77 other Bicolanos, many from Albay province. Due to his connections with influential Masons such as Dr. Miguel Morayta, Emilio Castelar and Francisco Pi y Margall, he obtained the release of his father and one Albayano named Macario Samson. Later, in February 1898 he obtained the freedom of Ludovico and ten other Filipinos.

 

Amidst this turmoil, Spain was already about to conclude the Treaty of Paris with the United States of America in the last month of 1898. Taking advantage of the period, Aguinaldo and his men formed the Malolos Congress on January 1, 1898 and after approving a Constitution, declared the independence of the Philippines on June 12, 1898. Arejola returned home previously by way of Hong Kong where he participated in organizing the Central Revolutionary Committee headed by Galicano Apacible. Arejola was one of the four delegates representing Ambos Camarines in the historic Congress. His three other co-delegates were Justo Lucban, Valeriano Velarde and Mariano Quien.

 

The American Dispensation

 

By December 1898, Spain formally turned over the Philippines together with other colonies to the United States of America thru the Treaty of Paris for the amount of 20 million dollars. This was an exceptional period, Spanish power was on the wane, American power was rising and the Filipino aspiration for self-governance was emerging but this was to be nipped in the bud. The Filipino forces under Emilio Aguinaldo battled the American army but the superiority in arms of the latter proved too much. Arejola's brother Ludovico was the general who met the oncoming American forces in Ambos Camarines but his brother's army was puny and ill- equipped and by March 31, 1901, Ludovico's ragtag army entered Naga to surrender and was received by the Americans with honors.

 

Meanwhile, Tomas Arejola, between 1902 and 1906 was in Japan together with Mariano Ponce and other educated Filipinos who were already planning to carry the fight thru parliamentary means. By 1907, they organized the Partido Nacionalista. Tomas Arejola became its first vice-president and in the subsequent elections he ran twice for two terms as Representative of Ambos Camarines and won (1907–1915).

 

In Congress, he became the Chairman of the Committee on Public Works, Forests and Mines and member of the Committee on Railways, Schools and Franchises. Thru his efforts, roads in Polangui were built, roads connecting Daet, San Vicente, Talisay and Indan were constructed while a road linking Tigaon to Goa became a reality. The bridge in Tabuco, Naga City and the Pawili bridge in Bula were his pet projects. He was the creator of the town of Canaman. Markets, and many schools he also legislated into existence among which was the Nueva Caceres High School (now Camarines Sur National High School) and other schools in Ambos Camarines but now within the province of Camarines Norte. He was also the major proponent of the law establishing the National Library of the Philippines.

 

In the election of 1916, Bicol was an entire senatorial district (6th District) and Arejola won the office as Senator of said district. The election for the district, however, was nullified by the Commission on Elections due to irregularities. Still up for a fight, Arejola ran as a candidate in the election of 1919 for provincial governors.^[1] But it was Julian Ocampo who won the election. After this, Arejola quit politics for good.

 

At the late age of 44, in December 4, 1909 he married a 16-year-old Spanish lass, Mercedes Caldera, daughter of Spanish surgeon Bibiano Caldera. They enjoyed a blissful marriage for sixteen years but bore no children. Arejola died in 1926 at the age of 60 due to tuberculosis. – Wikipedia, Bicol Biographies

 

 

Wikipedia’s Bibliography

 

1.  ^ G.R. No. 16332 (http://www.ustcivillaw.com/Jurisprudence/1920/gr_16332_1920.php)

Malanyaon, Jaime. Istorya kan Kabikolan (Kabikolan: A History), AMS Press. 1991.

Soriano, Evelyn Caldera. Bicolano Revolutionaries. Manila: National Commission for Culture and the Arts. 1999.

Reyes, Jose Calleja. Bikol Maharlika. Goodwill Trading. Makati City. 1992.