Aguinaldos keep fighting for their original flag

BAGUIO CITY—Emilio Aguinaldo Suntay III spent the early morning of June 12 at SM City Baguio to watch Teatro SLU (Saint Louis University) reenact the 1898 unfurling of the Philippine flag on a stage made up to look like the balcony of the Aguinaldo mansion in Kawit, Cavite.

Always quick with a smile, Suntay has been the public face of Baguio’s Aguinaldo family, whose members are custodians of the frayed revolutionary flag that bears a mythical sun with a human face.

Since 1998, when the country celebrated the Philippine Independence centennial, the family has been asserting that this was the same flag which Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo hoisted when he declared the country’s independence 113 years ago.

Questions about the relic’s authenticity resurfaced on Sunday, and Suntay again made himself available to defend the heirloom which Aguinaldo’s youngest daughter (and Suntay’s late grandmother), Cristina, had discovered folded and tucked in the hero’s deathbed in 1964.

“We’re a very private family and [protecting the original flag] was never an easy chore,” Suntay said.

Family censure haunted Suntay, 44, and his elder sister, lawyer Nenita Suntay-Tañedo, when they allowed the flag’s public display in 1998.

“I grew up with the din of this rule repeating and repeating in my head: Keep it safe, keep it a secret,” Suntay said.

Suntay said the flag in their custody was Aguinaldo’s favorite flag, which the latter put on display in 1949 and later kept in a vault.

Cristina and eldest sister, Carmen Aguinaldo-Melencio, were the hero’s favorite children, Suntay said, but politics divided the five Aguinaldo siblings when some of them became affiliated with Manuel Quezon, who defeated Aguinaldo in the 1935 presidential election.

“It was natural for Lolo to seek out someone who would take care of his prized possessions. It was Mama (Cristina) who kept by his side in the hospital, and she was the only child allowed at his deathbed,” Suntay said.

“Cristina and her husband, Don Federico Suntay, migrated to Baguio in 1969, after Aguinaldo’s death and she brought along the flag,” Suntay said.

Former Baguio Rep. Honorato Aquino, the family’s lawyer, said Suntay’s father and namesake kept the secret when he studied at SLU.

“I remember my father telling me stories about the flag. But I was young. I didn’t understand what the secrets were all about. Keeping the flag safe and hidden was drilled into us as we grew up,” Suntay said.

Suntay and Tañedo inherited the flag when Don Federico died in 2000.

Aguinaldo’s heirs in Baguio toiled to raise money for its upkeep, that has cost the family millions of pesos in expenses.

Suntay, an SLU management and economics graduate, said: “We had to invest in preserving the flag. Sometimes, it made raising a family hard. But when you look at the flag, you are certain preserving it is the best decision you’ve made.”

Told that the original flag’s deterioration is inevitable, Suntay and Tañedo recently converted the Aguinaldo Museum here into an interactive facility so the relic can inspire a younger generation of Filipinos.