Dinagyang’s redeeming value

By Herbert Vego

OVER coffee with businessman Alfonso Tan at Hotel del Rio, I asked him whether any of his hotels could still accommodate tourists coming to Iloilo City for the Dinagyang Festival on January 24 and 25.

“Fully booked,” he quipped.

As I was saying in a previous column, local and foreign tourists come to see and enjoy the colorful “tribal wars” and not to worship the Santo Niño. It’s a tourism event that doubles as fake history. A big lie, in other words.

OMG, isn’t it a sin to spread a lie?

In that column, I argued that the use of a religious icon to depict the reconciliation of the warring Ati tribes does not authenticate the “Barter of Panay” that is supposed to be the focal point of the festivity. Let me clarify further.

As perpetuated in history through the book Maragtas – written and published in 1907 Pedro Alcantara Monteclaro based on oral and written accounts – the supposed barter of Panay took place in the 13th-century.

The narrative is about 10 Bornean datus who had sailed all the way from Borneo to escape the tyranny of Sultan Makatunaw.

They gifted the hospitable native King Marikudo and Queen Maniwangtiwang with a golden saduk and necklace in exchange for the privilege to live in the lowlands of Panay.

Maragtas identified the 10 Bornean datus as Puti, Sumakwel, Paiburong, Bangkaya, Parohinog, Lubay, Dumangsil, Dumangsol, Dumalugdog and Balensuela.

Some of my readers wrote to denounce Monteclaro’s tall tale for lack of archaeological evidence on pre-Hispanic Panay Island.

Nobody disagreed, however, that our 13th-century forebears had definitely not seen a Santo Niño. The natives of that time (which Monteclaro estimated to be in the year 1212) could not have shouted “Viva Señor Santo Niño!” because they were still 309 years ahead of the introduction of Christianity in the Philippines by Ferdinand Magellan in 1521.

My brother Jesse – a retired assistant regional director of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) – wrote to say that the actual site of the “Barter of Panay” remains to be debatable. Was it in San Joaquin, Iloilo as Ilonggos claim?

Or was it Malandog, Hamtic, Antique as Antiqueños claim?

Wherever it was, there is no mention in history of our Aeta ascendants as warriors. They were peaceful followers of folk religions, primarily Animism, which involved nature spirits, ancestor worship (anitos), and deities like Bathala.

Most of us don’t know that Dinagyang is a take-off from the Kalibo Ati-atihan of Aklan. Kalibo is short for “isa ka libo” in honor of 1,000 native animists who were herded by the Spanish friars against their will to undergo mass baptism on the third Sunday of January 1569, according to the book Town of a Thousand by the late Aklan historian Roman dela Cruz.

In that year, most Aklanons were no longer Aetas. They looked diverse, but generally had dark hair and brown skin.

Anyway, Dinagyang has added value to Iloilo City as our version of Athens — the capital city of Greece that exploits ruins of ancient temples, stadiums and theaters to draw millions of tourists yearly.

In fact, City Hall has been promoting Iloilo City’s “heritage sites.” The Jaro Cathedral has the distinction of being the first and only cathedral built in Panay in 1864. It was in this Baroque structure where Ilonggo hero Graciano Lopez Jaena was baptized in 1865.

The Molo Church, constructed in 1831, earned the admiration of the national hero, Dr. Jose Rizal, because of its distinctive and dazzling Gothic/Romanesque architecture. He made his first and only drop-by visit here while sailing back to Manila from Dapitan.

Plaza Libertad, facing the old San Jose Parish, occupies a prime niche in history because it was here where Spanish soldiers surrendered to the Ilonggo revolutionaries led by Gen. Martin Delgado on December 25, 1898.