President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. remains unsure about accepting the invitation to attend the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland from Jan. 16 to 20 next year.
The President said the WEF would take place immediately after his state visit to China set for the first week of January.
“I am undecided yet. It’s traveling too much. That’s already the end of January. I’m going to China on the third,” Mr. Marcos said in a media interview on the sidelines of the 40th and 41st ASEAN Summits and Related Summits in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on Sunday.
He said other leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have also invited him to make state visits.
“They’ve all invited me. I said, okay, I won’t reject invitations. I just want to have everything scheduled whenever we’re available. That’s down the road. Perhaps next year, we’ll start honoring those invitations,” he said.
Mr. Marcos said his mother, former First Lady Imelda Mr. Marcos, had once teased him about spending plenty of time out of the country.
“Like my mom says, ‘When did you ever stay in the office?’” the President said.
Mr. Marcos said the more important question that needs to be asked is when he would start inviting investors to do business in the Philippines.
The President said the “determining factor” for his decision to fly to Switzerland would be whether the Philippines has improved the ease of doing business in the country.
“The real decision there is really going to be, if we are going to ask people to come to the Philippines, who are going to invest in the Philippines, [and] are we ready for them?”
Meanwhile, Mr. Marcos admitted that he barely had enough rest since arriving in Cambodia to attend ASEAN Summits and meet with the Filipino community in Phnom Penh.
“Well, you know, because what happens — you’re sitting there for what, eight hours, 10 hours, 12 hours, whatever it is. And then you come home, you have to take care of the things that have happened back home. So, you don’t really go straight to sleep. You don’t really eat properly. But you know, it has to be done. It’s okay. I mean, you know. Nobody died from honest, hard work,” he said.
Six months into office, Mr. Marcos has so far made state visits to Indonesia and Singapore and a working visit to the United States to attend the 77th United Nations General Assembly.
His most recent foreign trip was a working visit to Cambodia to attend the ASEAN Summits and Related Summits from Nov. 10 to 13.
Mr. Marcos said Monday he was honored to meet the leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and dialogue partners during his “very successful” trip to Cambodia.
“I was honored to meet them, and I thanked them for their efforts and contribution to our nation’s progress and development, as well as that of Cambodia’s,” the President said in his arrival speech at the Villamor Airbase.
Mr. Marcos also said that he was able to “articulate Philippines’ national interests” during his four-day trip to Cambodia.
During the summits, Mr. Marcos said there was “a very large area of consensus” among ASEAN member states, which have had to cope with problems in the food supply, and the rising price of oil and fertilizer.
He said these were problems common to the bloc’s members.
All member states understand each other. it cannot be done alone, it needs to be done together,” Mr. Marcos said.
“In all these meetings, we articulated our national interests and our commitment to working with ASEAN and our Dialogue Partners to find common ground to address the issues affecting our region and to strengthen cooperation,” the President said.
Mr. Marcos also said he also had bilateral meetings with leaders from Brunei, the Republic of Korea, Vietnam, and Canada.
“In these meetings, we discussed how we can deepen cooperation in key areas and exchanged views on important regional and global issues,” Mr. Marcos said.
The President also thanked the Cambodian government for extending their warm hospitality to the Philippine delegation during their stay in Cambodia for the 40th and 41st ASEAN summit.