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[av_heading heading=’EDITORIAL’ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=” av-medium-font-size-title=” av-small-font-size-title=” av-mini-font-size-title=” av-medium-font-size=” av-small-font-size=” av-mini-font-size=” admin_preview_bg=”][/av_heading]
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HISTORICAL markers and monuments deserve respect. Thankfully today as we mark the 161st birth anniversary of Ilonggo national hero Graciano Lopez-Jaena there are no kiosks selling ukay-ukay or stalls peddling beer and what not around his monument at Jaro Plaza. What a relief! For years every Dec. 18 we were appalled by the desecration of the hero’s monument. Mayor Jose Espinosa III finally banned vendors from Jaro Plaza this December and instead ordered its beautification.
The Jaro Plaza is managed by the city government. It has actually been renamed the Graciano Lopez-Jaena Park in honor of the great son of Jaro – the first editor of reformist newspaper La Solidaridad during the oppressive Spanish regime.
Historians regard Lopez-Jaena (Dec. 18, 1856 – Jan. 20, 1896), along with Marcelo H. del Pilar and Jose Rizal, as the triumvirate of Filipino propagandists. Of these three, Lopez-Jaena was the first to arrive in Spain and may have founded the Propaganda Movement. In Jaro, he wrote the satirical story “Fray Botod” which depicted a fat and lecherous priest. This incurred the fury of the friars. He finally went to Spain in 1879 when threats were made on his life.
Mayor Espinosa deserves kudos for finally cleaning up Jaro Plaza of unsightly kiosks and stalls. We recall Iloilo Provincial Board member Demy Sonza, a historian, being appalled by the presence of kiosks and stalls surrounding the Lopez-Jaena monument. For years he and the Graciano Lopez-Jaena Foundation had been begging the city government not to allow stalls around the hero’s shrine. Their pleas fell on deaf ears until Mayor Espinosa came in.
Lopez-Jaena died of tuberculosis in Spain 11 months short of his 40th birthday. He was buried in an unmarked grave at the Cementerio del Sub-Oeste of Barcelona. His remains have not been found and brought back to the Philippines but his patriotic legacy lives on. Offered the editorship of a Spanish newspaper in New York, he refused, saying “My brain and my pen belong to the Philippines and not to any foreign country.”
He expressed his love of country with these few words: “Philippines, I salute her with invocation of hope on my lips! The blue sea is her mantle, the most beautiful sky of the world her crown, adorned by resplendent stars. Whoever has not seen her has not seen the loveliest spot on earth.”
The Lopez Jaena monument proudly stands at the Graciano Lopez-Jaena Park / Jaro Plaza. It assures perpetuation of the hero’s memory for the coming generations. Let it not be desecrated ever again.
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