NO doubt, the annual Dinagyang Festival is Iloilo City’s top tourist attraction. Tourists from around the world come to view its colorful cultural presentations that usually depict religious and historical vignettes.
This corner, however, begs to disagree with its traditional identification with the Catholic Church. While it’s all right that most Filipinos believe in the Santo Niño, it should be classified merely as an entertainment fare, not a religious event. After all, its audience also comprises non-Catholic Christians, Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus, among others – live and on TV.
Unfortunately, Dinagyang perpetuates the belief that there had been tribal wars among the Aetas with a happy ending – warriors throwing their spears away and raising the Santo Niño while chanting, “Viva Señor Santo Niño!” This commemoration is a distortion of history and a religious misconception.
The ati-ati competition perpetuates a historical myth – the alleged conversion of Aetas into Christianity.
Looking back to what we learned from Philippine history, not a sentence confirms the notion that the Aetas were war freaks. On the contrary, they made peace with the anchoring 10 Bornean datus – Puti, Sumakwel, Paiburong, Bangkaya, Parohinog, Lubay, Dumangsil, Dumangsol, Dumalugdog and Balensuela — who had sailed on boats all the way from Borneo to Iloilo to escape the tyranny of Sultan Makatunaw.
They landed at the mouth of the Sirawagan River there, near the present town of San Joaquin in Iloilo. They met with the local ruler, King Marikudo, and his wife Maniwantiwan.
Marikudo agreed to barter the lowland to them in exchange for a gold salakot (a native helmet) for Marikudo and a long gold sumangyad (necklace) for Maniwantiwan.
The natives of that 13th-century era could not have embraced Christianity; could not have chanted “Viva Señor Santo Nino!”
It was only in 1521 or around 300 years later that Portuguese sailor Ferdinand Magellan arrived in Cebu with an image of the Santo Niño, to which the inhabitants were hostile.
But even the migration of the ten datus from Borneo to Panay island has provoked doubts on its authenticity among modern-day historians who think it could have evolved from legend or spoken history that ended up as a document known as the Maragtas, probably from about 1225.
Anyway, the big lie on the Aetas’ conversion to Christianity is not originally Dinagyang’s but a take-off from the Kalibo Ati-Atihan. You see, the name of Aklan’s capital town is short for “isa ka libo” in remembrance of 1,000 native “Indios” who were herded by the Spanish friars to undergo mass baptism on the third Sunday of January 1569. The converts were therefore lowlanders (descendants of the Bornean datus), not Ati warriors.
Dinagyang kicked off under the name “Ati-Atihan,” a copycat of Kalibo’s. It began in November 1967 at the San Jose Parish Church at Plaza Libertad, Iloilo City, through the initiative of Fr. Ambrosio Galindez. His faithful parishioners danced on the streets, their bodies covered with soot and ashes, to simulate the Atis dancing while carrying images of the Santo Niño.
In 1977 when the country was still under martial law, President Ferdinand Marcos ordered the various regions of the Philippines to come up with festivals or celebrations that could boost tourism.
It was then that the parish handed over to the Iloilo City local government the responsibility of organizing the annual Iloilo Ati-Atihan.
By authority of the city government, the late broadcaster Pacifico Sudario – a Jehovah’s Witness — renamed the festival “Dinagyang,” which means “merry-making”.
In the past decade, however, Dinagyang Foundation, Inc. has taken over the running of the festival. (hvego31@gmail.com/PN)
HERBERT VEGO
