GINATILAN

Ginatilan is an upland barangay bounded by Cabagdalan, Luca, Matun-og, Cabasiangan, and the Municipality of Compostela. It has a total land area of 2,558 hectares.

It is politically subdivided into fourteen (14) sitios, namely: Casili, Patag, Igam, Butong, Mahawong Gamay, Mahawong Dako, Nahulga’g Bangkaw, Mangga, Bagakay, Badiang, Mag-atubang, Ginatilan Proper, Amatugan, and Kolo.¹

BRIEF HISTORY OF THE BARANGAY

In WW II, Compostela guerilla forces led by Major Fabian Sanchez, even with inferior weapons, carried on hostilities against the mighty Japanese army and battles were fought at Guilaguila and Tubigan hills. Outnumbered and outweaponed, the resistance fighters had to retreat but not after inflicting heavy casualties on the enemy. Angered, the latter retaliated on innocent civilians, killing hundreds and burning almost all houses. Because of the presence of a great number of Japanese in Compostela, the American Liberation Forces in 1944 stationed its 77th Division until the Japanese surrendered. But between the years 1942 until 1944, people from Compostela who feared the anger and ruthlessness of the Japanese migrated to the uninhabited northeastern part of Balamban which they called “Kasili” after the marbled eel which was known locally as kasili and which they found abundant in the Ginatilan River.²

  

The marbled eel, also known as the giant mottled eel, Angulla marmorata, is a species of tropical anguillid eel that is found in the Indo-Pacific and adjacent freshwater habitats. It is distinguished from all other anguillid species by its mottled colour and the position of thedorsal fin. Adults have brown or black marbling on their backs over a grey-yellow background and a white belly.   The marbled eel has the widest distribution of all the Anguilla eels. It is usually found in tropical climates between 24°N to 33°S. It is not on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, but in Taiwan, it is endangered.³

According to the natives of Ginatilan, the original name of the barangay was Kasili as a proof to that the first public elementary school including the barangay hall was originally situated at Sitio Kasili even until the early 1970’s. It was established as a barrio of Kasili under the Republic Act 3590 otherwise known as the Barrio Charter which was approved on June 22, 1963. Accordingly, the barrio was founded in 1968. However there are no available written records found that could explain on why, how and when the school and the barangay hall were transferred to a more upland part of what is now known as Sitio Ginatilan Proper and why the barangay was renamed to Ginatilan. But one thing is sure, the barrio was renamed Ginatilan after it was made a barangay under Presidential Decree 431 of Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos on April 8, 1974 which prescribed a system of permanent and continuing registration for the creation of barangays, provided a procedure for the creation of barangay in areas where there were none and for the election of officials thereof.

Nowadays, most of the people of the barangay who had lost their historical documents that could explain why and how was their barangay was named Ginatilan would often say that Ginatilan is a coined word of the Cebuano words “hilan” which means “a place prone to accidents, violent deaths, or the presence of supernatural beings, aside from its having a singularly tortuous road” and “tiilan” which means “at the foot” referring to the forest at the foot of Ginatilan Proper which was believed to be inhabited by elemental spirits and ghosts. Oral tradition pointed out that the first influx of people coming to the barangay for slash and burn or kaingin happened during the first American occupation of Cebu in 1910. Accordingly, the favorite place for those kaingineros was the then forest at the foot of Ginatilan Proper. Moreover some of the people would tend to believe that Ginatilan became a barangay in 1880’s and was first called as Ginatilan in 1910.²

It could be a corrupted tradition which might had originally retold the history of Compostela which was then established as:

1. a barrio of the Municipality of Danao (headed by Captain del Rosario) in 1844 by a Spanish captain Manuel Aniceto del Rosario who was commissioned by the higher Spanish authorities to establish local government units in the northern part of Cebu which was named Compostela upon the suggestion of Father Jose Alonzo, a Roman Catholic friar who, by some historical account, reportedly came from the town in Spain and brought along with him the image of the town’s patron saint, Señor Santiago de Apostol (St. James the Apostle); 
2.  as a town in 1866;
3.  as a part of Liloan during the reorganization of all towns under the American regime in 1903 until 1918; and 
4.  as an officially recognized independent municipality on January 17, 1919 when the Philippine Assembly passed a law, sponsored by the then Speaker Sergio Osmeña Sr., after a committee headed by Hilario Kanen spearheaded the move for its independence by making representations before the Philippine Assembly. 

Based on historical perspective, it is more probable than not that the place was named Ginatilan after the Municipality of Ginatilan in southwestern Cebu which separated from Samboan as a barrio and was established as a town on February 2, 1829. More probably the Cebuano guerilla troops who were sent by the United States Forces of the Philippines Cebu Area Command to assist the Balamban and Compostela and who had able to penetrate the barangay were really natives of the Municipality of Ginatilan which had sent, according to their local history, a great number of heroic sons to other parts of Cebu to fight against the Japanese and “many never returned to their hometown”. The name of the Municipality of Ginatilan was derived from the Cebuano word “hinatdan” which means literally “a place, person, or thing that is transported or supplied with goods” from the rootword either the Cebuano “hatod” or the Tagalog “hatid” (to transport or to bring into another place), the infix “-in”, and the suffix “-an”. Thus, “hinatodan” which grammatically became Cebuano “hinatdan” or Tagalog “hinatidan” (brought with something). But as it was said, the Spaniards mispronounced it to “hinatilan” which was hispanically spelled as Ginatilan.⁴

The first barangay captain of barangay Ginatilan was Felipe Sundo who served as such during the entire Marcos regime. He was then followed by Sofronio “Roning” Gaihe. At present the barangay is headed by its first lady barangay captain, Eva L. Villamor.

ECONOMY

Basically, the barangay is living on agriculture. Mostly it raises mangoes as prominent agricultural products.¹