Bayan ng Roxas

Introduction

Roxas, officially the Municipality of Roxas, is a 1st class municipality in the province of Isabela, Philippines. According to the 2020 census, it has a population of 65,839 people.

The municipality is the center of business and commerce in the Mallig Plains Region. In 1839, two new provinces were created by the Spanish conquistadors dividing the La Provincia del Valle de Cagayan into two. One retained the name Cagayan, while a new province of Nueva Vizcaya was created. Bindang was dissolved as Barrio Vira under the municipality of Gamu, Isabela.

On July 1, 1948, President Elpidio Quirino established Executive Order 136 creating Barrio Vira as an independent municipality named "Roxas" to honor his predecessor Manuel A. Roxas who just died a few months back. It was then inaugurated on July 4, 1948, and Rafael Lintao became its first mayor. The municipality of Roxas is one of the 34 municipalities comprising the wide province of Isabela. It is exactly located in the central-western part of the province, bounded in the north by the municipality of Mallig, on the north-east by the municipality of Quirino, on the east by the municipality of Burgos, on the south by the municipality of San Manuel all within the province of Isabela and on the west by the municipality of Paracelis in the province of Mountain Province.

Early settlers were the Kalingas who originated from adjacent places in Mountain Province and parts of Kalinga. Despite occasional clashes with Kalingas, Ilocano people settled in the area, and increased their number with an influx from Ilocanos from Central Plains of Luzon and Ilocos.