Read this in The Manila Times digital edition.
Third of a series
DOING rudimentary research online about the word “mejora” — after my interview with INCTV last June 6, 2026 — for this series for The Manila Times, I came across a Facebook/Meta group called “Hiligaynon Lamang” that has 49,018 members as of June 18, 2026. According to the group, their social media page is devoted to Hiligaynon popular literature. On that page, there was a public post by a user named Aaron Karlson dated Jan. 13, 2024, who asked in Hiligaynon, among other things, what the word “mejora” meant.
Some of the answers — mostly in Hiligaynon as well — to the post are as follows (I translated them to the best of my ability):
One responded “tangible proof of improvement” or (positive) changes in the community. Several gave synonyms in Hiligaynon which included: samwad/umwad/uswag/tin-ad (roughly translates to “improvement”) and kapuslanan (root word: pulos or usefulness/functionality). Another defined it as something good or pleasant (to look at) in its completed/finished form, presumably in the sense of an edifice or project. There was one who answered that it is a manifestation of a positive undertaking.
All the answers are consistent with the idea that mejoras are improvements made, no longer relating to property in the sense of civil law usage, rather as they pertain to the material and moral lives of the people as Gregorio Sancianco used the term in “El progreso de Filipinas” in 1881. It is also consistent with my 84-year-old Ilonggo father’s usage of it, as well as in the internal vocabulary of the Iglesia Ni Cristo (INC).
Probing further on the topic led me to the article of Dominic Sy of the University of the Philippines-Diliman, “‘Anak ng Bayang Dukha’: A Computational and Comparative Keyword Analysis of Sakdalista and Communist Discourses from 1925 to 1941” published in 2022 which quoted “Sariling Diwa,” the main editorial of Sakdal, the organ of the Sakdalista movement, under the title “Ang Busog at ang Gutom”:
“Unti-unti tayong nalilibang sa mga halalan at sa mga kandidato, at sa pagkalibang na ito ay nawawala na sa ating isip ang Pagsasarili. Binubuntunan tayo ng salapi upang gamitin sa mga lansangan at sa mehoras publikas (emphasis supplied by VY)... Ang lahat ng ito’y pamatay sa bayang nagdaralita, sa bayang walang makain halos, sa bayang ni isang panyo kung minsan ay wala nang magamit upang pahirin ang kanyang pawis.” (Sakdal, Aug. 30, 1930).
Sy “use[d] computer tools and corpus linguistic techniques to do a comparative Keyword in Context (KWIC) analysis of the writings of two contemporaneous political movements: the Sakdalistas and the communists.” One of the clusters Sy focused on for comparative KWIC analysis was the notion of “bayang nagdaralita.” He noted that in the three Sariling Diwa titles where the bayang nagdaralita cluster appears, “there is not just a critique of imperialism but an argument that some Filipinos are benefiting from the current system while their countrymen suffer in poverty.” Furthermore, mejoras publicas, or “public improvements,” in the context of candidates and elections (i.e., “sa mga halalan at sa mga kandidato”) were being used — among other tools and devices — to lull the people into a false sense of security so as to forget about their agitation for independence (i.e., “at sa pagkalibang na ito ay nawawala na sa ating isip ang Pagsasarili”).
One of these Sariling Diwa articles in question was published on Aug. 30, 1930, when the country’s struggle for independence had just emerged from the tumult of Filipino-American relations in the 1920s centering around the Cabinet Crisis of 1923 — when Filipino members of Gov. Leonard Wood’s cabinet resigned their posts en masse to protest his “interference” in Filipino political autonomy. The country was unable to build on the preamble of the Jones Law of 1916 that promised independence for the Philippines once a “stable government” was in place in the archipelago.
The Sariling Diwa articles criticized the lack of development toward the independence aspirations of the Filipino people, instead the country was being “distracted” (i.e., “nalilibang”) by elections, public works, mejoras publicas, etc. Moreover, the Sakdalistas believed, according to Sy, that some cooperative Filipinos were benefiting from this situation.
All indications point to the importance of mejoras publicas to the Filipino psyche, particularly during the American colonial period. One part of this has to do with the single-minded obsession of the Filipinos from the late 19th century spilling over into the early 20th century with tangible and visible public improvements as an indicator of the much-desired national development for the Philippines. The other part of this is the equally burning preoccupation of American proconsuls in the archipelago with public works and public improvements.
To highlight this, in 1921, when President Warren Harding sent a commission co-chaired by former governor W. Cameron Forbes and Leonard Wood to the country to investigate the readiness of the Philippines for self-rule as attested to by outgoing President Woodrow Wilson, the state of public works in the archipelago became one of utmost concern, particularly for Forbes who was often called “Caminero” or “road worker” by Filipinos.
Forbes told his audience in Oroquieta, Misamis (Occidental):
“If every governor and every presidente (i.e., municipal mayor — VY) and all the municipal boards knew they could not get elected if the roads got worse when they were in office... they would be pretty sure to keep them in condition... Every man who sees a road going by his place going to pieces should write to his representative and tell him he will lose his vote if it is not remedied. That is the way to express public opinion. That is what is meant by Democracy. That is what is meant by independence. Every independent citizen can express himself with the ballot.”
Forbes noted in his journal that his message was well received by his audience: “They nudged each other and smiled, and it evidently went home.”
There is no way to prove that Forbes’ words were instrumental in associating mejoras publicas with the political success of politicians, but they soon became intertwined ideas in the country.
To be continued