Today is Philippine Independence Day. Known in the Philippines as ‘Araw ng Kasarinlan’, or ‘Day of Freedom’, this day commemorates the Philippine Declaration of Independence from Spain on June 12th 1898.
Since the middle of the sixteenth century, the Philippines had been part of the Spanish Empire. A secret group called ”Katipunan’ consisting Philippine activists who wanted independence had been uncovered in 1896. This led to the beginning of the struggle for independence.
By 1897, a truce had been signed between the revolutionaries and the Spanish with the leaders of the revolution accepting to be exiled outside the Philippines. In 1898, after attacks on Americans interests in the region by the Spanish during the Spanish-American War, the US gave support to the independence movement, bringing back the rebel leader Emilio Aguinaldo from exile, who rallied local Filipino support.
United against the Spanish with the American forces, over 300 hundred years of Spanish rule was brought to an end when Aguinaldo proclaimed the independence of the Philippines in Kawit, Cavite, on June 12th 1898.
Under the Treaty of Paris, Spain agreed to cede the Philippines to the United States for a payment of twenty million dollars. A year later, some Filipino’s started to feel that all that had happened is that Spanish rule had been replaced by American rule, leading to the Philippine–American War. The result of that was the suppression of Filipino insurrection and ongoing American occupation with limited self-rule.
It wasn’t until July 4th 1946 that the islands gained their full independence.
I couldn’t find any good videos of musicians with birthdays today, so here is the Spanglish version of the Ketchup Song. Go dance!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMT698ArSfQ
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