Every Sept. 16, Mexico celebrates its independence from Spain with a national holiday featuring fireworks and cultural performances that recall the beginning of its fight for freedom.
The commemoration traces back to 1810, when Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, a Catholic priest known as Father Hidalgo, called for independence in Dolores. After his speech, Hidalgo raised the banner of the Virgin of Guadalupe, inspiring a large and unruly army.
Hidalgo was later defrocked by the Spanish Inquisition and beheaded by the civil government for revolt, with his head displayed in Guanajuato after his forces were accused of causing a massacre.
José MarÃa Morelos, another priest, took up the revolution and formed a more disciplined force, but he was also captured and beheaded as the struggle against Spanish rule continued for years.
The movement reached its decisive point in 1821 when AgustÃn de Iturbide, a soldier who had initially supported Spain before joining the independence movement, led troops into Mexico City and declared independence. His Plan of Iguala, also known as the Plan of Three Guarantees, called for freedom from Spanish control, the preservation of Roman Catholicism, and equality among citizens.
For the Philippines, Mexico’s independence carries historical significance because the two countries were once closely linked through colonial administration, trade, religion, and cultural exchange.
From 1527 to 1821, expeditions were fitted out in Mexico, while the Philippines was administered as part of the Viceroyalty of Mexico under the Spanish Crown.
The Mexican viceroy sent officials, missionaries, military reinforcements, and official dispatches to Manila, while authorities in the Philippines reported on the colony’s conditions and needs.
Before Manila became an archbishopric in 1595, its bishopric belonged to the Archdiocese of Mexico. The Inquisition of Mexico also had a representative in Manila.
For more than two centuries, the Manila-Acapulco galleon trade also linked the Philippines and Mexico, carrying people and goods between Asia and the Americas from 1565 to 1815.
Galleons bound for Acapulco carried Chinese porcelain and silk, Persian rugs, Arabian perfumes, Moluccan spices, Indian fabrics, Philippine pearls, pottery, and other Asian goods.
From Acapulco, these products traveled to Mexico City, Puebla, Guadalajara, Veracruz, and other cities, with some reaching Guatemala, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, and Argentina.
Return voyages carried Mexican silver, the annual subsidy for the Philippine colonial government, and products such as Saltillo wool, cacao from Chiapas and Tabasco, and cochineal from Oaxaca.
The trade initially brought prosperity to Filipino and Mexican merchants, but complaints from Spanish merchants led the Crown to restrict it in 1593 and turn it into a government monopoly.
Even with these restrictions, Manila and Acapulco became major links in a trans-Pacific commercial network, although competition from the Royal Company of the Philippines after 1785 and the growing arrival of ships from the United States and Europe gradually weakened the trade.
Exchange of culture and people
The Manila-Acapulco galleon trade carried cultural influences in both directions, shaping food, language, religion, agriculture, music, dance and customs in the Philippines and Mexico.
The Philippines received plants from Mexico that later became familiar parts of Filipino life, including achuete, cacao, maize, chico, camachile, maguey and tobacco. Cassia alata, known in the Philippines as Acapulco because of its Mexican origin, also became established in the country.
Mexican influence also reached Filipino music, dance and customs. The guitar, flute, drum, trumpet and violin were introduced during the colonial period, while the Jarabe, Kuratsa and Pandango sa Sambalilo were identified as dances of Mexican origin. Town fiestas, ferias, the blessing of animals and plants by priests, the Christmas belen, colorful lanterns and figures used in religious celebrations, and the Philippine Christmas custom of panawagan were also attributed to Mexican influence, with panawagan linked to the Mexican posada.
Mexico, meanwhile, received Philippine and Asian goods through Manila. Chinese porcelain, silk, ivory-inlaid furniture, Persian rugs, Japanese lacquerware, Philippine earthenware and wood carvings reached Mexico aboard the galleons and became part of the material culture of Mexican communities. A shopping district established in Mexico City in 1700 was called the Parian, after Manila’s Parian, where many Oriental goods were sold.
Philippine agricultural products also reached Mexico. Coconuts, mangoes, tamarind, and rice were introduced and propagated there, while names such as mangas de Manila, rakatan, and ilang-ilang de Manila preserved the Philippine connection in Mexican usage.
From colonial ties to formal diplomacy
Mexican leaders attempted to maintain contact with the Philippines and encouraged Filipino leaders to resist Spanish rule and revive the Manila-Acapulco trade.
However, those efforts did not succeed.
The Philippines and Mexico would formally establish diplomatic relations more than a century later, on April 14, 1953.
That same year, the Philippines opened its embassy in Mexico City, while Mexico opened its embassy in Manila.
The formal relationship gave the two countries a new framework for ties that had already developed through centuries of shared history.
The centuries-old commercial link between the Philippines and Mexico has a modern counterpart in Philippine companies’ presence in the Mexican market.
One of the examples is International Container Terminal Services, Inc. (ICTSI), which has expanded its operations at the Port of Manzanillo, one of Mexico’s key gateways for trade with Asia.
Recently, ICTSI’s Mexican arm, Contecon Manzanillo S.A. de C.V. (CMSA), received approval to handle vessels with drafts of up to 15.5 meters at its Second Specialized Container Terminal, or TEC-II.
The terminal can accommodate vessels up to 400 meters long, including ultra-large container ships with capacities of up to 24,000 twenty-foot equivalent units. CMSA became the first and only terminal operator at the Port of Manzanillo with the capability to handle vessels of this size.
While Mexico’s freedom ended a political arrangement, it did not erase the cultural traces and historical ties that it had developed. The occasion, likewise, offers the Philippines another reason to look back at a history shared across the Pacific. — Mhicole A. Moral
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