| NEGROS
ISLAND and BACOLOD CITY
Negros belongs to the
Visayas, the central group of islands of the Philippine archipelago.
It is divided into two provinces,
Negros Occidental-with its capitol Bacolod City-and Oriental.
Before Spanish colonization Negros was named Buglas, 'the
Divided', which - even meant differently in the past- can
be applied in many ways until today: administratively (two
provinces), linguistically (two languages), socially (extreme
rich and extreme poor), and politically (the root of major
conflicts). Besides conflict in Negros, Bacolod City as well
its capitol, offer also stories of nonviolence:
The Fall of
the Spanish Government
 |
On November 05, 1898 an army
of farm workers equipped with cannons surrounded the Spanish
headquarters in Bacolod and caused the capitulation of the
Spanish government. Soon after the Act of Capitulation was
signed, the liberating army marched in Bacolod showing how
'heavily armed' the troops really were: 'cannons' which were
nothing but rolled bamboo mats painted black and mounted on
two-wheel carabao carts, and palm tree and nipa stalks cleverly
carved and darkened to look like riffles. With the flickering
light of the ebbing day, the Spanish observers belfry the
day before could not distinguish the silhouette of the dummy
guns from the real weapons. The Spanish forces in Bacolod
fell over a clever ruse and feint – without loosing
a drop of blood.
| Taken
from History of Occidental Negros by Modesto P. Sa-Onoy |
The Negros Nine
In the early 1980th during the
Marcos dictatorship three priests and six laymen were wrongly
accused for murder of a Negrense mayor. Being under house arrest
while waiting for the trial the three priests feared about torture
and murder of the six laymen who were imprisoned. As an act
of nonviolent intervention they ‘broke in’ the jail
to protect their companions. Due to the fact that two of the
priest were foreigners (one of the Fr. Niall O’Brien)
and the effect of the unusual action of nonviolence the case
became an international issue. Finally, the Negros Nine were
released.
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