General Santos

General Santos, called GenSan for short, is a highly urbanized city in the Soccsksargen region on the island of Mindanao, in the southernmost part of the Philippines. It lies about 1,050 kilometers southeast of Manila and 120 kilometers southwest of Davao, and it occupies the whole of South Cotabato's coastline on Sarangani Bay, though the Philippine Statistics Authority groups it under the province while it is governed independently. The city is named for General Paulino Santos, the army commander who led 62 Christian settlers from Luzon to the shores of Sarangani Bay in 1939, and the Blaan people, its original inhabitants, called the place Dadiangas. It became a city in 1968 and is the regional center for commerce and industry, with a tropical wet and dry climate that is among the driest in the country. The 2024 census counted 722,059 residents.