BAYAN Muna Rep. Carlos Zarate (PL, Bayan Muna) yesterday called out the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas for eliminating World War II national heroes from the design of the new P1,000-denominated banknote and replacing them with photos of flora and fauna, saying it benefits people who want to revise the country’s history.
“By doing this the BSP is helping unscrupulous groups and individuals who are now aggressively trying to revise our history. Banknotes represent not just a country’s tourist attractions but what a nation holds dear and serves as a constant reminder to its people.
Eliminating our heroes from them is a way of erasing them from the Philippine psyche,” said the militant lawmaker.
The deputy minority leader was obviously referring to the alleged attempts of the Marcos family to revise the country’s history while former senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., the son of the late dictator, is running for president.
“We strongly urge the BSP to reconsider this revisionist makeover by putting back our heroes, even as the flora and fauna are also incorporated in the new design,” said Zarate.
Zarate said that while it is not wrong to feature Philippine flora and fauna in our banknotes, “it should not be at the expense of removing totally our heroes who stood and fought for our rights and liberty.”
BSP Governor Benjamin Diokno earlier said the central bank has decided to replace Vincente Lim, Josefa Llanes-Escoda, and Jose Abad Santos with a photo of the Philippine eagle to “focus on fauna and flora in the Philippines.”
The new banknotes will be released in April 2022.
The BSP has also already corrected the misspelled scientific name of the Philippine eagle, from “Pithecophega jefforyi” to Pithecophaga jefferyi.
“It is bad enough that the BSP misspelled the scientific name of the Philippine eagle, but it is even worse that it erased very important historical figures from the new banknotes, in effect also denigrating their historical contribution in the defense of our freedoms and the fight against foreign aggression,” Zarate said.
