Hilarion Guia
Hilarion Magbuhos Guia was a Filipino educator, leprosy activist and the first mayor of Culion, Palawan. He was afflicted with leprosy until the 1960s.
Early life
Hilarion Magbuhos Guia was born on October 21, 1942, to Gil Guia and Maria Magbuhos in Mabini, Batangas. He is the youngest of nine children of a family which owned vast agricultural lands. He and five other siblings contracted leprosy and the family had to sell the lands for medical treatment expenses.Biography
Living with leprosy, education and teaching
Hilarion Guia was orphaned at age three left to the care of his grandmother Francisca Gonzales. Guia went to the Culion leper colony in May 1950 motivated with the prospect of attaining formal education. He attended the Culion Catholic Elementary School and St. Ignatius Academy. He was declared cured of leprosy in the early 1960s.Guia moved to the Central Luzon Sanitarium in Tala,Caloocan and enrolled at the Holy Rosary College obtaining a degree in education in 1965.
He returned to St. Ignatius Academy in Culion as a teacher and worked there for four decades.
Townhood of Culion
Guia was an advocate of converting Culion, then part of Coron town to becoming a municipality of its own. He became close friends with another advocate and politician Ramon Mitra in the 1960s. As Senator, Mitra filed a bill in 1971 to make Culion a municipality. However the efforts were frozen when President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law.Along with Catholic priest Ignacio Moreta, Guia campaigned and convinced the residents of the Culion of the idea. He argued that by Culion becoming a municipality would lessen its dependence on the Department of Health on services and Culion as a town will have access to the national budget.
After People Power Revolution of 1986, Mitra became speaker of the House of Representatives and Congressman Dave Ponce de Leon revived the Culion municipality bill. Culion eventually became a municipality in 1992.
Mayor of Culion
Guia ran in the inaugural mayoral election in May 1995 outbesting other candidates who never contracted leprosy. Emiliano Marasigan was his vice mayor.Later life and death
After serving as mayor, Guia returned to teaching after being mayor. He advocated against social stigma against people afflicted with leprosy as well as healthy children who lives in Culion who are also affected by the town's association with leprosy. He died in March 2016.Personal life
Hilarion Guia was afflicted with leprosy which rendered his hands unusable. He admitted that like others who contracted leprosy, the disease has affected his self-esteem but as of 2006 this is no longer the case.Guia married Rosalinda Hilao, a daughter of a leper who remained unafflicted of the disease. They did not have biological children but the couple became surrogate parents of five children from different leprosy parents.