History

Philippines to Maharlika? Lately, the issue about the idea of President Rodrigo Duterte about changing our country's name from Philippines to Maharlika, has been a very hot topic on the social media, television and in the congress. The proposal was first made by Sen. Eddie Ilarde, who was a supporter of Marcos by filing the Parliamentary Bill 195 in 1987. This proposal was revived by our present president and expressed his approval and support on this. However, many people are greatly opposing this idea and just find this as unconstitutional and weird.

Pro's: *Independence The name of our country, "Philippines" is believed to be derived from the name of Spain's King Philip II when the Spaniards came and our country was then a colonial country. To be able to be truly independent, they have proposed to change the name of our country from Philippines to Maharlika which was defined as a Malay word that means concept of serenity and peace. Maharlika is a Tagalog word which means nobility. They say that to consider ourselves as truly independent, we must throw away any bonds that remind us of colonialism, especially during the reign of the Spaniards who ruled for more than three centuries, and one way to do it is to change our name which was given and derived from a Spaniard.

*It establishes a sense of identity.

Because we are possessing a name which was given to us by the Spaniards, it is believed that we don't have our own identity yet. During the reign of other countries who ruled our country, we are influenced with their customs and traditions, and it gives us no identity at all. To change our country's name is to develop our national identity.

Cons: *It is costly and time-consuming. The idea of changing the name of our country from Philippines to Maharlika requires a lot of time because almost everything in our constitution will be changed. There may also be a need for charter change and we are very much aware that the president have always wanted to change our democratic government to federalism, and this may pave the way to his wanting for charter change. The amendment of the constitution regarding the changing of the Philippines' name to Maharlika is a tedious and expensive process.

*It is not beneficial. Just the mere idea of changing our country's name, many of us will ask questions like "Will it help improve our lives? And some won't even care for they believe that this will give no good

and won't be beneficial to them. The poor people will think of the necessity of such change and if there is really an urgent need to tackle about changing the name of our country. And for most people, there's no need to change the name of our country for it won't give good and benefit our people.

As for me, I am not in favor of the proposal of changing our country's name to Maharlika. Philippines has been our country's name known by all other countries of the world. It entails the values of being true Filipinos. It mirrors the way how Filipinos live. The Spaniards' objective to gain converts of Christianity was realized and the Philippines, having a majority of Christians, reflects us, being religious. Our country is facing a lot of problems right now concerning the people and I think we are just wasting our time arguing about this issue when in fact, the government, particularly the president should be focusing on the more important problems of our country. The name Philippines may came from the Spaniards but it carries with it the history of our country which gives us a better understanding on how our country and the Filipinos before were able to survive, and develop our nation into what it is now, and give what we all have now-- freedom.