5 Pesos Shaded 5, President of the Commonwealth

Negros Occidental was one of several Philippine provinces that printed its own emergency currency after Japanese forces disrupted normal banking in late 1941 and early 1942. The Currency Committee issues were authorized locally rather than by Manila, giving each province's notes a semi-official status that remained legally ambiguous throughout the occupation — accepted by necessity, not by formal monetary law.

The Filma Press attribution is notable: most provincial emergency issues were farmed out to whatever commercial printer was available and had stock. Paper quality and ink consistency vary considerably across surviving examples of this series, which complicates attribution when notes lack clear printer markings.

The "Shaded 5" designation distinguishes this from a parallel printing with a plain numeral — a small but catalogued die variation.