Of Consuls and Consulats
By Antonio V. FigueroaThe importance of Davao region just seven-two years after its conquest by a Spanish-led expedition in 1848 was highlighted with the opening of a Japanese consular office in March 1920. Though it was originally an annex of the Manila Consulate, the growing economic influence of Japanese investment and labor in the region promoted it to an embassy on February 6, 1932.
At the time the consulate was opened, Davao was already home to a huge Japanese population, roughly a sixth of region’s inhabitants. Most Okinawans, the migrant workers and the expanding Japanese control of the hemp economy contributed greatly to the progress of the area.
The confluence of growth and demographic expansion eventually inspired the national government to promote Davao into a city, the second the Mindanao after Zamboanga, which was the administrative center of the Americans in the south.
Years after the Japanese consular annex opened in Davao, the Republic of China (Taiwan) under Dr. Sun Yat-sen and by now had established a consulate in Manila. To attend to the sizable Chinese population in Davao, Te Chiu Im, a local Chinese resident who was into beer distribution and involved in the founding of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce of Davao, was appointed as its first honorary consul of Davao (1923-28).
Sun’s death in 1925 led to the rise of Chiang Kai-shek, a former commandant of the Koumintang’s Whampoa Military Academy, and the coup of Canton in 1928. Taiwan’s post-war consul in Davao was S.T. Mih when the office reopened in November 1947. He was assisted in the post by M.C. Chen, as deputy consul, and Johnny Huang, as secretary.
With the rise of the People’s Republic of China as member of the United Nations on November 25, 1971, Taiwan, an original UN member, was forced to close its consulate in the city. During the UN’s founding, the Philippines was still a commonwealth of the United States.
Extant historical records, on the other hand, show that even Britain, during the prewar period, had also appointed a foreign affairs liaison in honorary capacity. War accounts identify the honorary British consul in Davao City as Alex Brown, who was among those rounded up by the Imperial Army in December 1941.
In August 1945, eight years after getting independence from the Dutch, Republic of Indonesia opened its consular mission in Davao City on December 17, 1953. Given its impact in trade and economy decades later, the office became a consulate general on September 23, 1974 by virtue of an edict signed by Indonesian envoy to the Philippines Marsekal Sri bima Ariotedjo.
On December 11, 1995, Malaysia became the second member of Association of Southeast Asian Nations to open a chancery in Davao City. The opening was part of the growing role Malaysia would play in two key historical events involving Muslims of Southern Philippines: (a) the signing on September 2, 1996 of a peace accord between the Philippines and the Moro National Liberation Front and (b) a similar event on October 15, 2012, between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.
Although the US established its embassy in Manila on July 4, 1946 after Washington “granted” the Philippines its independence, it was not until July 2007 when the Americans opened a virtual consulate, known as the “American Presence Post” (APP), in the city. Initially, it catered to the issuance of visas through the internet, which was manned by a Digital Outreach Team.
Over the next seven decades (1945-2015) other friendly countries opened their own diplomatic missions in the city, managed by honorary consuls, all prominent socio-civic Davao icons.
The first honorary consul of the Czech Republic was Gilbert C. Go, a well-known trader. Republic of Palau appointed Miguel Iñigo, a businessman, as its honorary consul for life in Davao. Antonio Brias, spouse of Maricris Floirendo, daughter of late banana king Don Antonio, became the first honorary consul of Spain in Davao; he was succeeded by Genaro Lon y Ozami.
Ma. Lourdes G. Monteverde was appointed honorary consul of Mexico while Rowena Vida-Lisbona, the Davao-based assistant general manager of Maersk Filipinas, a shipping firm, was anointed as honorary consul of Denmark.
Dennis Uy, founder of the Davao-based oil firm Phoenix Petroleum Philippines Inc. (PPPI) and 2013 Datu Bago awardee, was installed honorary consul of Kazakhstan to the Philippines. His Udenna Holdings recently bought Enderun Colleges and FamilyMart.
Meanwhile, Joaquin C. Rodriguez, a Davao resident who was past president of Benguet Mines and wife of Sonja Habana (daughter of former city councilor Antonio Habana) is Republic of Serbia consul ad honorem to the country. Two new consulates under an honorary officer were also opened later in Davao City.
On June 17, 2017, Davao resident Austrian Dr. Peter Faistauer was officially designated honorary consul of Austria. Five months thereafter, business man Edgar N. Ang, a Davao native, was invested the honorary consul position by the Republic of Korea on November 24, 2016.
On June 20, 2017, German Klaus Doring, a long-time Davao resident, journalist, and educator, was installed as honorary consul of Germany of Mindanao. He is best known for introducing German language.
In 1852 the Bremen Senate established a Consulate in Manila with Peter Jenny as its first Consul. It lasted until 1868. The establishment of this Consulate improved the trade relations between the Philippines and the Bremen state.
The German state of Hamburg also established its own Consulate in Manila with a German known only as Peters as its First Consul. Peters had been in Manila since 1835. At the time of the establishment of the Hamburg consulate in 1849, there were only 17 Germans in Manila.
In 1849, there two others consulates in Iloilo and Cebu, founded in 1886.
Antonio V. Figueroa, my first Journalism friend in Davao wrote in October 2022:
"Although the Europeans, particularly the Spaniards, first set foot in Davao in 1521, German imprints did not find space in local historical accounts until the 1880s, chiefly in scientific explorations that placed the region in world map. The legacy the Germans have left behind has only been sparingly mentioned in Davao’s study of historical writings.
In the region’s floral past, several German names stand out as indelible milestones given their names have been immortalized in two significant flower discoveries in Davao.
The Rafflesia schadenbergiana, called by the Bagobo as ‘bo-o,’ is named after naturalist Alexander Schadenberg, a native of Breslau, Germany, who braved the forest fastnesses of Sibulan, Santa Cruz, Davao del Sur. The burrowing skink (Brachymeles schadenbergi Fischer), discovered in 1885 in Davao, was also named in his memory. He was, in personal life, a pen pal of Dr. Jose P. Rizal, the Filipino national hero.
On the other hand, Vanda sanderiana, the waling-waling discovered in 1882 in Mount Apo, was named after Heinrich Friedrich Conrad Sander, a German orchidologist, while Rafflesia apoanum Stein was in honor of Stuttgart, Germany-born Berthold Stein, a German botanist (orchid specialist), lichenologist (lichen expert), and mycologist (a scientist who studies fungus and its genetic and biochemical properties) known for his contributions in the field of taxonomy.
Dr. Otto Koch, a German naturalist then living in Cebu, collaborated with Schadenberg in the discovery of the rafflesia, the world’s largest parasitic flowering plant. Together, they made two successful ascensions of Mount Apo.
German legacy was further magnified during American occupation, this time in public governance with the appointment of Henry Gilsheuser who, during and after war, also went to serve the Philippine government in different capacities.
Born in Hessen, Germany, in 1881, he became the penultimate American governor of Davao before a Filipino administrator governor was appointed in 1915. He took up public education in Germany but continued his studies in New York when his parents migrated to the U.S.
Gilsheuser fought in the Spanish-American War, appointed third lieutenant in the Philippine Constabulary in 1903 and rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel. He served as district secretary of Cotabato, governor of the Lanao province, and later appointed by Gen. John J. Pershing, commander of the Military Department for Mindanao and Sulu, as Davao governor in 1910.
Commonwealth President Manuel L. Quezon, when war broke out, appointed him fuel and transportation administrator of the Civilian Emergency Administration and was in-charge of the Emergency Control Commission during President Sergio Osmeña’s watch. During the presidency of Manuel A. Roxas, he was a member of the US-Philippines War Damage Commission.
For his efforts, he was awarded by the Philippine government the Philippine Legion of Honor. A dyed-in-the-wool Mason, he died in Manila at the Lourdes Hospital in Manila on Feb. 27, 1964 at age 83.
Germany, a country with a third of its population affiliated with Roman Catholicism, shares religious affinity with Davao. In fact, three of the religious orders founded by St. Arnold Jannsen, born in Goch, Germany, have provinces (branches) in Davao City, namely the Societas Verbi Divini (SVD, 1875) the Missionary Sisters Servants of the Holy Spirit (SSps, 1889), and the Sister Servants of the Holy Spirit of Perpetual Adoration (SSpSAP, Sept. 8, 1896).
The SVD priests took over the management of the Saint Francis Xavier Regional Major Seminary at Catalunan Grande, Davao City, in the 1980’s from the Foreign Mission Society of Quebec (PME Fathers), while the SSpSAp, also known as the Pink Sisters, holds court at the Holy Spirit Adoration Convent, along Seminary Road, Catalunan Grande, Davao City.
To underpin Germany-Davao alliance, the University of Southeastern Philippines, a state learning institution, introduced years ago under its Institute of Language and Creative Acts the study of German language, which was initially headed by journalist-professor Klaus Döring, a native of Spenge, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, and Davao resident since 1999.
Adding another feather to the partnership was the opening of the consulate of the Federal Republic of Germany in Davao with Döring, a long-time German court interpreter, language teacher and married to a Davaoeña, was installed as honorary consul in southern Mindanao.
(To be continued!)
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