Professional Documents
Culture Documents
• The local elite who usually own the factors of production (particularly land),
have become instrumental in propagating their wealth through rent-seeking
and patronage.
At the time of Rizal’s birth, his father was a rice planter, renting a
large parcel of land from the Dominican friars in their hometown of
Calamba, in the province of Laguna. The Dominicans charged
exorbitant rents from their Calamba tenants and did not give receipts
for the sums they collected so they would pay fewer taxes. (The
religious orders, which owned vast amounts of lands, were not exempt
from paying taxes).
When Rizal's father and the other Calamba tenants reported this tax
evasion scheme to the civil authorities, the Dominicans retaliated by
seeking their eviction and their replacement with non-Calamba
tenants.
Before Rizal had set up his practice in Hong Kong, the Supreme Court
of Madrid in 1891 rendered its final decision denying Rizal's petition to
stop the eviction of the Rizal family and other Calamba tenants by the
Dominicans. It was mandated that tenants of Calamba be expelled if
they fail to leave the hacienda before the date set by the law. Rizal’s
family dispossessed from the Dominican-owned hacienda in Calamba
in the absence of Rizal. Governor- General Weyler, who took the place
of Governor-General Terrero, was sympathetic to the friars and so he
deployed 50 soldiers from the peninsular regiment of artillery to drive
out the poor tenants and the soldiers showed no mercy when they
burned the houses as the tenants exceeded to the given 12 days to
evacuate their belongings.
• Rizal's Settlement Project in Sabah (North Borneo)
While on a short Christmas vacation to Singapore in December
of 1891, Rizal met William and Ada Pryer on the S.S. Melbourne ship.
After learning that Pryer had just been appointed manager of British
North Borneo, Rizal proposed to set up a Filipino settlement in North
Borneo, composed of the Calamba tenants who had been evicted from
their lands by the Dominicans.
On June 26, 1892, Rizal arrived in Manila with his sister, Lucia. They
registered at the Hotel del Oriente, the most modern hotel at the time.
Later in the afternoon, Rizal went to Malacañang to meet Despujol. Ten
days of discussions followed during which Rizal presented his proposals
and answered Despujol's questions.
The consul whom Despujol coursed his reply, informed that the
Governor-General had received his letter but he considered the Sabah
project anti-patriotic as the Philippines was short of labor to cultivate
its lands, and that he did not favor the establishment of Filipino
community in Sabah.