The Philippines won The Hague arbitration ruling in Manila’s challenge of Beijing’s sweeping claim in the South China Sea. We also have the 1950 Philippine-US Mutual Defense Treaty recently boosted by the US-PHL Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement.
As in poker, it seems we have a good hand going for us. Alas, we are not playing our cards right. We don’t have to play hard ball with China all the time but any smart card player should know how to deal with his opponent and let him raise his bet.
President Rodrigo Duterte thinks he can play the appeasement game with China and in the process loses longtime friends like the US.
Supreme Court Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio who is steeped and versed in the South China Sea dispute, said the Philippines can still exact the most from a rising China without raising the dragon’s hackles.
Carpio cites Vietnam’s playbook which gives it a windfall in strong trade ties with China while not buckling down against Beijing in its territorial claim in the Paracels. While this stance triggered a brief naval battle between the two countries, Hanoi maintains an unwavering policy on the Paracels.
China knows Vietnam is not a nation that can be bullied—unlike the Philippines. Vietnam has a long history of standing up to the big powers like France and the US which were brought down in defeat in Dien Bien Phu and Saigon.
Carpio, in an ANC interview with news anchor Karen Davila , said the Philippines could deploy its few coast guard and two destroyers in patrolling the West Philippine Sea to send a message to China.
Hey, we are friends but you’re stepping into my yard without permission. It’s not saber rattling but more in the form of the concept “good fences make good neighbors.” Now if China is the real friend that Digong perceives it to be, then our giant neighbor should respect our territorial integrity.
That the Philippines does not know how to play its cards was evident in the last summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. As chairman of the Asean 50th meeting of leaders and with Duterte presiding, the Philippines failed to muster the signing of a joint communique on Code of Conduct on the South China Sea. Of course with China’s client states Cambodia and Laos dissenting and resisting any discussion of the SCS dispute, a solid stand on the issue is difficult.
Under Asean’s “constructive engagement” posture, the 10-nation group has gained the reputation as nothing but a talk shop. After all the tight security around the PICC venue and lavish dinner preparations at Malacanang Palace, Asean still cannot shed its tag as a talk shop.
Meanwhile, we extend our congratulations to Senator Alan Peter Cayetano for being appointed by the President as the new Secretary of Foreign Affairs. For sure, the bicameral Commission on Appointments will give Cayetano an easier time than it did Perfecto Yasay Jr. who hid his being an American citizen from the President and the CA. He finally admitted to being an American—but only after so much hemming and hawing and downright lying.
He was finally exposed by the sharp and pointed questioning of CA member Rep. Josephine Sato. She brought down the foreigner aspiring to be the country’s top diplomat.
I wonder where Yasay is and what he is doing these days. Is he still in the Philippines or in the US? Since Yasay renounced his American citizenship and did not take the necessary steps to reacquire his Filipino one, he is a stateless person. He paid the price for wanting the best of both worlds.
Napoles as state witness
Meanwhile the Department of Justice is seriously considering making accused pork barrel queen Janet Lim Napoles a state witness.
Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre said turning Napoles into a state witness would depend on what she reveals and says on the witness stand.
Napoles as state witness must be the reason why we are seeing a new wave of politicians crossing sides from the opposition to the ruling PDP-Laban party of Duterte and Koko Pimentel.
They think they will be able to get special treatment if they switched sides to the ruling party. Aguirre has made clear there would be no selective justice once Napoles names names. Some high-ranking senators and congressmen must be spending sleepless nights wondering if Napoles would implicate them. We know of certain senators and congressmen who should have been in the first batch of indictees but were left out because of their strong ties to the past Aquino administration. We are not coming out with their names and will just let Napoles do it. Napoles in court would be even bigger than the impeachment trial of the late Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona.
It would be interesting to hear the questions posed by the usual suspects. We can expect questioning to impugn the testimony of Napoles. By their questions, you shall know them. Careful now, boys, do not show your hand too much lest you confirm the speculations and suspicion about your link to the pork barrel scam.
The Napoles camp has asked the justice department for her transfer to a jail in the National Bureau of Investigation because of alleged threat to her life in the Taguig detention center. How safe is Napoles at the NBI holding facility? Recall that Albuera, Leyte Mayor Roland Espinosa was gunned down by policemen inside his cell and Korean businessman Jee Ick Joo was killed right inside PNP headquarters in Camp Crame.
The sooner Napoles spills the beans, the safer she would be because then the motive for silencing her becomes pointless except for reason of revenge by those implicated.
But Senator Francis Pangilinan questions the move to make Napoles a state witness. He said Napoles as mastermind of the pork barrel scam is not the least guilty.
I think Napoles’ identification of those who benefited from the scam would be sensational news. Let us hear what she, as state witness, reveals.
The question is whether she is credible. She has nothing to lose and everything to gain once she breaks her silence.
Recall that Napoles was received by former President Noynoy Aquino at Malacañang late at night. She was brought to the Palace by then-presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda and Department of the Interior and Local Government Secretary Mar Roxas. After the meeting with Aquino, where Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa was present, Napoles was even escorted by Aquino to Camp Crame.
This is the same Aquino who didn’t even bother to be present at the arrival at Villamor Air Base of the bodies of the PNP Special Action Force victims of the Mamasapano massacre.
Aside from Senator Pangilinan, Senators Paulo Aquino, Risa Hontiveros, JV Ejercito and Panfilo Lacson are also wary that Napoles might be used by Justice Secretary Aguirre and the Duterte administration in persecuting members of the opposition.
Well, what goes around comes around. If the usual suspects were able to get away during the Aquino administration, the Duterte administration this time will go after them and hold them accountable.
TV weatherman Kim Atienza says it best: “Ang buhay ay weather —weather lang.”