FIDEL
IBAÑEZ (1890 -?)
BECAUSE OF political vacuum in Cavite created
by the sudden death of Representative Augusto A. Reyes in 1925, incumbent
Senator Antero Soriano was prevailed upon by his colleagues, Senate President
Quezon, to run for the vacant position.
Soriano was elected, but before he could finish his term in the House of
Representatives he died suddenly in 1928.
Fidel Ibañez,
incumbent justice of the peace of Cavite, ran in the special election called
after Soriano’s death, and he won by a comfortable margin under the banner of
the Nacionalista-Consolidad Party.
Born in San
Francisco de Malabon (now General Trias) on March 30, 1890, Ibañez finished the
elementary grades in his hometown, then took up his intermediate and high
school courses in Cavite. He was a
working student. He served as municipal
secretary of his town for two years, 1910-1911. Continuing his studies, he enrolled in the college of law,
University of the Philippines, graduating with an L.L.B. degree in 1916. After passing the bar examinations, he
successively held the positions of law clerk, attorney, and then chief of the
law division in the bureau of lands. He
transferred to the department of agriculture and natural resources where he was
given the additional job of secretary of the National Coal Company.
In 1922 he returned
to his province to assume the position of justice of the peace of Cavite, which
became his jumping board to the Philippine Legislature. In the House of Representatives Ibañez was
member of the committees on banks and corporations: on fisheries; on franchises;
on public works; and on friar lands.
Ibañez died with
his family in Caridad, Cavite.
[Source: Directorio Oficial de la Camara de
Representantes. Manila, Bureau of
Printing, 1929.]