Pinanggang sugbuanong banay

For the Diamond anniversary of the Cebu City Charter, the Cebuano community  honors the legacy of 75 families who contributed to making Cebu City what it is today. Initiated by the private sector to reestablish the strong foundation and values of the Cebuano family, the project will be implemented for a whole year from March 2012 to February 2013.

To identify the 75 families, a Search Committee was formed in September 2011 composed of four  figures in the academe:  Dr. Erlinda Kintanar-Alburo, Dr. Hope Sabanpan-Yu, Dr. Romola Ouano-Savellon, and myself.  To avoid overlapping, each member was assigned a cluster of family names by initial letters:  A-D, E-K, L-R, and S-Z.

The two main criteria for the search were: 1) residence in  Cebu City and 2) having  at least 3 members who have contributed to the development of, or given honor to, the city of Cebu in any of these  fields: governance and community service; business and industry; professions (education, law, medicine, engineering, etc); sports, media and the arts; religion and apostolic work; and environment, science and technology.  Four other guidelines were used: 1) other members of the family whose contributions have been recognized outside Cebu City (province, country or abroad) may be added to the three names; 2) the family must have started playing a role in the city or larger community not later than 1965; 3) wives should be considered as representing their family of origin instead of their husband’s family; and  4) families of members of the Search Committee and the Core Group for the anniversary Celebration would be excluded.

The search process included the review of published news and features in local papers and interview of key informants, as well as solicitation of nominations from all the city barangays. A deadline for the submission of solicited nominations was set on Nov. 30 ,  2011. The search was launched  on  Dec. 12,  2011 at the Ayala Terraces. Recognition of the 75 families was held on Feb.  24, 2012, the 75th anniversary of the Cebu City Charter,  at the Waterfront Hotel in Lahug.

Members  of the Search Committee,  with the core group  assigned for the whole diamond anniversary celebration, met several times to discuss the nominations.  Some individuals with the same family names but whose relationship to each other was doubtful were waitlisted, then dropped when such relationship could  not be confirmed.

A few families were combined when they evidently belonged to the same lineage. On the other hand, at least three families of the same name have been considered separately.

For a whole year, 11 sessions to serve as  Memorial Presentations of the distinguished families will be held in various universities to feature the family cluster of the month with a special Cebuano trait as theme.  The period will run  from March 2012 to January 2013. Family members or their representatives will be formally acknowledged as a whole during the culmination activity in February 2013.

Twelve traits have been recognized to describe the Cebuano Family: hardworking, thrift and industry, religiosity, hospitality, self-reliant/resourcefulness, good sense of humor, musicality/creativity, resiliency/pliant, family-value-oriented, respect for elders/courtesy, entrepreneurship, and trustworthiness.

Each value stands as the theme for the monthly memorial lecture. These values also comprise the the lyrics of the diamond anniversary song entitled Pinanggang Sugbuanong Banay ,which is also the slogan of the diamond celebration. The core group adopted this slogan to stress the significance of the Cebuano family throughout the growing years of the city.  At the same time, the phrase captures the pride and joy with whch the whole Cebuano community celebrates their achievements.