National Library of the Philippines

National library of the Philippines

The National Library of the Philippines ( or Aklatang Pambansa ng Pilipinas, abbreviated NLP, lang es) is the Philippines' official repository of information on cultural heritage and other literary resources. It is located in the district of Ermita in Manila, near historically significant offices and institutions such as the Museum of Philippine Political History and the National Historical Commission. As with these entities, it is under the jurisdiction of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA). The national library is notable for being the repository of original copies of José Rizal's Noli Me Tangere, El Filibusterismo and Mi último adiós.

The National Library of the Philippines traces its beginnings to the establishment of the Museo Biblioteca de Filipinas (Museum Library of the Philippines), established by a royal order of the Spanish government on August 12, 1887. It opened on October 24, 1891, at the Intendencia in Intramuros, then home of the Manila Mint (as the Casa de la Moneda), with around 100 volumes and with both Julian Romero and Benito Perdiguero as director and archivist librarian, respectively. today observed as the birthdate of both the National Library and the Philippine public library system. In addition, the Philippine Library and Museum was placed under the supervision of the Department of Justice. However, luckily for library officials, a locked box containing the "crown jewels" of the National Library: the original copies of Rizal's Noli Me Tangere, El Filibusterismo and Mi último adiós, was left intact. Tiburcio Tumaneng, then the chief of the Filipiniana Division, described the event as a happy occasion. Scandal arose in September 1993 when it was discovered that a researcher from the National Historical Institute (now the National Historical Commission of the Philippines), later identified as Rolando Bayhon, was pilfering rare documents from the library's collections. According to some library employees, the pilfering of historical documents dates back to the 1970s, when President Ferdinand Marcos began writing a book on Philippine history titled Tadhana (Destiny), using as references library materials which were subsequently not returned. The chief of the Filipiniana Division at the time, Maria Luisa Moral, who was believed to be involved in the scandal, was dismissed on September 25, This digitization was one of the factors which led to the birth of the Philippine eLibrary, a collaboration between the National Library and the University of the Philippines, the Department of Science and Technology, the Department of Agriculture and the Commission on Higher Education, which was launched on February 4, 2004, as the Philippines' first digital library. The Philippine President's Room, a section of the Filipiniana Division dedicated to works and documents pertaining to Philippine presidents, was opened on July 7, 2007. On September 26, 2007, the National Library was reorganized into nine divisions per its rationalization plan. In 2010, Republic Act No. 10087 was signed, renaming the National Library to the National Library of the Philippines.

In 1954, President Ramon Magsaysay issued an executive order forming the José Rizal National Centennial Commission, entrusted with the duty of "erecting a grand monument in honor of José Rizal in the capital of the Philippines". The Commission then decided to erect a cultural complex in Rizal Park with a new building housing the National Library as its centerpiece, a memorial to Rizal as an advocate of education. To finance the construction of the new National Library building, the Commission conducted a nationwide public fundraising campaign, the donors being mostly schoolchildren, who were encouraged to donate ten centavos to the effort, and constructed at a cost of 5.5 million pesos. The library's eight stack rooms have a total combined capacity of one million volumes with ample room for expansion. several sets of The Philippine Islands, 1493–1898, a collection of rare Filipiniana books previously owned by the Compañía General de Tabacos de Filipinas, and the documents of five Philippine Presidents. A significant portion of the National Library's collections are composed of donations and works obtained through both legal deposit and copyright deposit due to the limited budget allocated for the purchase of library materials; the 2007 national budget allocation for the library allocated less than ten million pesos for the purchase of new books. while the manuscripts of Rizal's masterpieces have reportedly deteriorated due to the lack of funds to support 24 hour air conditioning to aid in its preservation. In 2011, Rizal's manuscripts were restored with the help from German specialist. Major documents in the National Library of the Philippines, along with the National Archives of the Philippines, have great potential to be included in the UNESCO Memory of the World Register according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.