THE European Union’s ambassador on Wednesday confirmed that the Philippines had officially rejected a Trade-Related Technical Assistance worth 6.1-million euros or P380 million for 20,000 families particularly in Mindanao.
EU Ambassador Franz Jessen also confirmed that the Philippines would also reject an additional P2.4-billion in European aid for sustainable projects.
Jessen said the Philippines had officially rejected the European aid by leaving the TRTA documents unsigned when it returned them to the EU office.
He said the Philippines has formalized the rejection by leaving the TRTA document unsigned and returned it to the EU office in Manila.
“It was formalized in the sense that we had, for example, the TRTA, a document that actually had to be signed by the end of the year. And that has been returned to us unsigned,” Jessen said.
He then called on the Philippine government to step back and consider the interest of the Filipinos, particularly the 20,000 families who would be affected by the rejected aid and projects.
“I think if they take a step back and they look at what is actually in the interest of the Philippines and the Filipino people, they would realize that the principal issue that we’re discussing right now actually may not be that important as it has become in the discussion,” Jessen said in a weekly breakfast meeting in Manila.
He said both parties had different sets of objections especially in the area of “rule of law,” “democracy” and “human rights”.
Jessen said the Philippine government had rejected the EU aid by the end of 2017.
The Philippines is a recipient of EU aid in different projects on justice, human rights, livelihood, health, the peace process, among other things.
The Department of Foreign Affairs announced last year that it would reject all forms of EU aid so that the latter would stop meddling in the Philippines.
But Jessen said the conditions attached to EU aid “are not specifically for the Philippines” but for the EU’s cooperation “with all countries in the world.”
“For me, it’s a bit sad that after 30 years plus of development cooperation, we suddenly get into this situation,” he said.
“And the independence of Philippine foreign policy”•I’m still struggling a bit to understand how we are interfering in that.”
In May, EU on Asia and the Pacific managing director Gunnar Wiegand declared that if the Philippines did not want aid, the bloc would transfer the development grants meant for the Philippines to other countries.
In a round-table discussion among selected journalists, Wiegand said if the Philippines decided not to accept the EU grant, the bloc would not “beg to ask the Philippines” to accept it.
“We do not believe that we have to, in any way, beg to ask Philippine ‘please can you take our money?’…but if we are not welcome to provide money, there is no lack of other countries in the region and beyond where the money can be very well used,” Wiegand, who is now in the Philippines to attend this week’s Asean Regional Forum, said.
He said that EU was adhering to a standard principle to all recipients of their aid, which was to “observe the rule of law and the guaranty of human rights.”