A firm believer in "with privilege comes responsibility," the highly respected and much-loved family matriarch, trailblazer, businesswoman, qualified attorney, style maven, arts patron, and philanthropist Consuelo "Chito" Madrigal will continue to live on and be forever remembered through the good works of her legacy: the Consuelo "Chito" Madrigal Foundation, Inc.
This feature story was originally titled as Leaving A Legacy of Hope, and was published in the 2008 annual issue of Tatler Philippines Society. Some photographs and text were also from the feature story A New Face of Grace from the April 2004 issue of Tatler Philippines
While sitting in your car, waiting for the stoplight to turn green, a child in tattered clothes comes up to your window, his soiled hand outstretched for any alms you can offer him. You give. Someone asks you to buy a few tickets to the latest fundraising dinner to help a chosen beneficiary. You give. The priest of your parish needs donations for victims of the latest calamity. You give. But what happens to the impoverished after all the money is spent?
Being born into a life of privilege, the late matriarch Consuelo “Chito” Madrigal Collantes always made helping those who are in need a priority, long before she established her own foundation, the Consuelo “Chito” Madrigal Foundation, Inc (CCMF).
Although philanthropy was not indoctrinated into Chito or her siblings as a formal lesson, they saw it in their father, upbringing,” says Susana “Chuchu” Madrigal-Eduque, Chito’s niece who lived with Chito from 1979 to 1990, and the chairman of the foundation. “My dad [Antonio Madrigal] always said Lolo would always help the Dominican priests who greatly influenced and helped him. He also helped people from his hometown in Bicol by lending them money, interest-free. Lolo was really a gentleman of that nature,” adds Attorney Gizela “Ging” Gonzalez-Montinola, another niece of Chito (who lived with her Tita Chito until the age of four). Ging is the foundation’s president.
“While he was living on Balete Street, I remember that priests were always around Lolo. They would just show up. His third daughter Josefina spearheaded the Holy Rosary Crusade. She greatly helped the religious. My mother Pacita, on the other hand, who was among the first women senators and head of the Department of Social Welfare, was highly responsible for the passing of the Social Security Law. So I think helping people is really in the Madrigal family.”
Aside from being well-educated, Chito was privately tutored in painting, singing, harp playing, horseback riding and tennis. That was most likely the time when Chito’s passion for the arts blossomed, which later became the reason for her chosen advocacies. “Helping people was always in her nature, whether in a formal way or not,” says Ging. “When she was still the social director for the Hyatt Hotel, she would always help the up-and-coming designers and models. She would help artists too, displaying their works in her art gallery. Then she became the founding chairman of the Friends of the Cultural Centre of the Philippines.”
Chito also acted as a board member of caritas Manila, president and board member of the Vicente Madrigal Memorial Foundation, a board member of the Santo Tomás Charity Foundation and vice-chairman and chairman of the Executive Committee of the Bayanihan Folk Arts Foundation. “Being who she is, she would get a lot of requests for donations from other charities—and she would generously give,” says Ging.
