History
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mati,_Davao_Oriental)
The City of Mati is the capital city of Davao Oriental which is a Philippine province located in Mindanao. This is the easternmost province in the country and it is highly urbanized, with a population of 122,048 Matinians as of the year 2007 census. The native word Mandaya “Maa-ti” was the root of the city's name. This eventually became its name because early settlers in the City of Mati often use this expression referring to a creek that was located in the center of the town, which had a habit of getting dried up too quickly even after a series of heavy rain falls.
Establishing an outpost in the City of Mati was Captain Prudencio Garcia who became the city’s pioneer politico-military head in the year 1861. The captain together with a gentleman named Juan Nazareno founded the City of Mati. and two additional towns in Davao Oriental. Nowadays, a certain number of families in Davao claim that when they check their family tree, it will lead them to be descendants of these two adventurous gentlemen.
1903 was the year when Mati was declared by virtue of Act No. 21 as a municipality and Act No. 189 of the year 1907 further reaffirmed the Municipality’s Constitution. The name of its first mayor was Francisco Rojas while the first elected mayor in the Municipality was Patricio Cunanan in the year 1923.
In the year 1942, the Japanese Occupation forces was landed in the town of Mati, Eastern Davao. On 1945, the liberation in the town of Mati, Eastern Davao was accompanied by the Allied Philippine Commonwealth troops of the 6th, 10th, 101st, 102nd, 103rd, 104th, 106th, 107th and 110th Infantry Division of the Philippine Commonwealth Army, 10th Infantry Regiment of the Philippine Constabulary and the Davaoeño guerrilla units against the Japanese Imperial forces until the end of World War II.
Starting in the year 1967, Mati became the capital of Davao Oriental’s provincial government even up to this date. As per the historians and other historical accounts, pioneer settlers in the city were the tribes of Kalagans, Mandayans, and Maranaos. The cultures that were brought by these tribes carried a strong influence of Arabic and Indo-Malays.
The reasons why these tribes decided to be relocated in the City of Mati are the town’s strategic position and the lands high fertility that even up to this day, still attract a lot of settlers. Immigrants in the City of Mati include Americans, Chinese, and Spanish people. A lot of Filipinos from different parts of the country also get drawn by the city’s charm. Most of the time people migrate to Mati, either because of marriage, or due to employment shortages in their own cities. As a result, the municipality enjoys a multi cultural heritage coming from the variety of cultures and ethnicity.
For many years now, the City of Mati has been enjoying greater economic growth due to the fact that the city has better accessibility to southern Mindanao’s trade center, accessibility to the city of Davao, reliable power supplies, has access to a lot of communication facilities, and productive land planted with different fruit trees. With this, Mati is basically a spot in the Philippine archipelago that businessmen would truly consider to invest in and for residents to immigrate in.
The town of Mati, Davao Oriental was founded in 1903. It celebrated its centennial in 2003.
Cityhood
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
On June 20, 2007, the Commission on Elections officially proclaimed the ratification of Republic Act 9408 converting the Municipality of Mati into a component city to be known as City of Mati.
Final tabulation showed Yes got 18,267 votes while No garnered only 846. There are 18,267 actual voters out of the 51,287 registered voters in 26 villages and 266 polling precincts during the June 18 plebiscite.
However, Mati recently lost its cityhood, along with 15 other cities, after the Supreme Court of the Philippines granted a petition filed by theLeague of Cities of the Philippines, and declared the cityhood law (RA 9389) which allowed the town to acquire its city status, unconstitutional. The said cities, the court ruled, did not meet the requirements for cityhood.
More than a year later, on December 22, 2009, acting on the appeal of the so-called "League of 16 Cities" (an informal group of the sixteen local government units whose cityhood status had been reversed), the Supreme Court reversed its earlier ruling as it ruled that "at the end of the day, the passage of the amendatory law (regarding the criteria for cityhood as set by Congress) is no different from the enactment of a law, i.e., the cityhood laws specifically exempting a particular political subdivision from the criteria earlier mentioned. Congress, in enacting the exempting law/s, effectively decreased the already codified indicators." As such, the cityhood status of the said 16 LGUs is effectively restored.
On August 27, 2010, Mati City in Davao Oriental is now plain old Mati again. It shares the fate of 15 other cities, after the Supreme Court reinstated a 2008 decision declaring as “unconstitutional" the cityhood laws converting 16 municipalities into cities.
A previous law required towns aspiring to become cities to earn at least P100 million annually, which none of the 16 did.
Voting 7-6, with two justices not taking part, the SC reinstated its Nov. 18, 2008 decision declaring as unconstitutional the Republic Acts (RAs) converting 16 municipalities into cities again.
