The Quezon City government and the National Historical Institute will lead today the commemoration of the 197th birth anniversary of Melchora “Tandang Sora” Aquino, the most prominent heroine of the 1896 Philippine revolution.
Mayor Feliciano Belmonte Jr. will preside over simple rites at the Tandang Sora shrine in Banlat, Barangay Tandang Sora. Regional trial court Judge Thelma Ponferrada will be the guest of honor and principal speaker.
It was at Aquino’s farmhouse in Barangay Banilad, Caloocan, now part of Quezon City, that Andres Bonifacio and the katipuneros plotted to overthrow the Spanish regime. Aquino fed the katipuneros and attended to the sick and wounded among them.
When she was captured, she refused to reveal the names of the katipuneros. She was deported to Guam where she spent six lonely years in exile. She spent her remaining years at her home in Balintawak where she died on Feb. 20, 1919.
Quezon City built a shrine in her honor in the barangay, which the city government named after her. Among the other honors she received were the inclusion of her image in a series of banknotes and a commemorative stamp, as well as her profile on a five-centavo coin. – Perseus Echeminada