The Filipino community in the CNMI is celebrating the 117th anniversary of Philippine Independence today.<\/p>\n
Filipino organizations will gather at the McDonald\u2019s Middle Road for a flag-raising ceremony at 7am.<\/p>\n
Messages from Philippine President Benigno Aquino III as well as from agencies like the Department of Labor and Philippine Overseas Employment Agency will be read.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt will be simple but the spirit of nationalism will be there,\u201d said Philippine honorary consul Eli Arago, who will also be doing the welcoming remarks.<\/p>\n
CNMI government officials are invited to the event, including Gov. Eloy S. Inos and Lt. Gov. Ralph DLG Torres.<\/p>\n
Filipinos are encouraged to wear barongs and Filipinianas to show their heritage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a form of respect,\u201d United Filipino Organizations president Bong Malasarte said.<\/p>\n
After the flag-raising, the community will be having breakfast at the fast food chain.<\/p>\n
According to Arago, he will also fly to Tinian tomorrow to be with Filipinos there.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Filipino community on Tinian will also be having a ceremony,\u201d Arago said.<\/p>\n
The theme for this year\u2019s Independence Day is \u201cKalayaan 2015: Tagumpay sa pagbabagong nasimulan, abot kamay na ng bayan\u201d (Independence 2015: Triumphs through reforms, within nation\u2019s reach).<\/p>\n
On Sunday, various Filipino organizations will be coming together at the Marianas Business Plaza for the whole-day festivity of Pistang Pinoy. It will start at 9am and end at 10pm.<\/p>\n
According to Malasarte, there will be games, shows, and raffles. Vendors will also be around to serve food. At 6pm they will be starting the main show, which is a singing and impersonating contest.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe invite everyone especially our kababayans to attend our celebration,\u201d Malasarte said.<\/p>\n
Major sponsors for this event this year are IT&E and LBC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Filipino community in the CNMI is celebrating the 117th anniversary of Philippine Independence today….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[26,42,5350,5351],"class_list":["post-204042","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-cnmi","tag-food","tag-independence-day","tag-united-filipino-organizations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204042","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=204042"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204042\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=204042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=204042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=204042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}