By Mauro Gia Samonte
IT should be taken as a welcome coincidence that President Rodrigo Duterte was grouped with Presidents Xi Jinping and Donald Trump among the early speakers at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) virtual meeting last week. This had a way of making his speech truly relevant in context.
As expected, Trump used the forum to ventilate his politicizing of the coronavirus, putting all blame for the pandemic on China.
He said: “In the United States, we launched the most aggressive mobilization, since the Second World War. …We will distribute a vaccine. We will defeat the virus. We will end the pandemic. And we will enter a new era of unprecedented prosperity, cooperation, and peace.
As we pursue this bright future, we must hold accountable the nation which unleashed this plague onto the world: China. In the earliest days of the virus, China locked down travel domestically while allowing flights to leave China — and infect the world.”
In the face of Trump’s virtual saber-rattling, President Xi kept his cool throughout his speech. Not once did he refer to the US by name whenever he needed to allude to China’s simmering tensions both in Trump’s trade war and in the conflict over the South China Sea, as well as a response to Trump’s accusations.
“Facing the virus, we should put people and life first. We should mobilize all resources to make a science-based and targeted response. …Facing the virus, we should enhance solidarity and get this through together. We should follow the guidance of science, give full play to the leading role of the World Health Organization (WHO), and launch a joint international response to beat this pandemic. Any attempt of politicizing the issue or stigmatization must be rejected.”
Calm and bearing
It is to President Duterte’s credit that speaking in the UNGA for the first time in his three-year stay in Malacañang, he conducted himself with calm and bearing quite so uncharacteristic of his normal public performances.
On the Covid-19 pandemic, he declared: “The Philippines values the role that the United Nations plays in its fight against the pandemic. As a middle-income country whose economic advances have been derailed by the pandemic, we welcome the launch of the UN Covid-19 Response and Recovery Fund.
“The world is in the race to find a safe and effective vaccine. When the world finds that vaccine, access to it must not be denied nor withheld. It should be made available to all, rich and poor nations alike, as a matter of policy.
“The Philippines joins our partners in the Asean and the Non-Aligned Movement in raising our collective voice: the Covid-19 vaccine must be considered a global public good. Let us be clear on this.”
It was clear that though Trump proclaimed that the US vaccine would be made available to the rest of the world, his proclamation at the same time of the America First policy was unequivocal.
In contrast, what had President Xi got to say?
Cooperation, not exclusivity
Actually, he said a lot on striking up cooperation, and not exclusivity, with the rest of the world in matters of pursuing development and political stability.
For instance, he declared, “China is the largest developing country in the world, a country that is committed to peaceful, open, cooperative and common development. We will never seek hegemony, expansion, or sphere of influence. We have no intention to fight either a Cold War or a hot war with any country. We will continue to narrow differences and resolve disputes with others through dialogue and negotiation. We do not seek to develop only ourselves or engage in a zero-sum game. We will not pursue development behind closed doors.”
There were several issues over which Trump and Xi were avowedly at odds. For instance, while Xi expressed recognition of the WHO as having ultimate clout over the pandemic, Trump contradicted this with: “China condemned my travel ban on their country, even as they canceled domestic flights and locked citizens in their homes. The Chinese government and the World Health Organization, which is virtually controlled by China, falsely declared that there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission. Later they falsely said people without symptoms would not spread the disease. The United Nations must hold China accountable for their actions.”
In regard to the Paris climate treaty, Xi said: “The Paris Agreement on climate change charts the course for the world to transition to green and low-carbon development. It outlines the minimum steps to be taken to protect the Earth, our shared homeland, and all countries must take decisive steps to honor this agreement. China will scale up its intended nationally determined contributions by adopting more vigorous policies and measures. We aim to have CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060.
We call on all countries to pursue innovative, coordinated, green and open development for all, seize the historic opportunities presented by the new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, achieve a green recovery of the world economy in the post-Covid era and thus create a powerful force driving sustainable development.”
By contrast, Trump would not hide his displeasure with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. He said: “By contrast, after I withdrew from the one-sided Paris climate accord last year. America reduced its carbon emissions by more than any country in the agreement. Those who attack America’s exceptional environmental record while ignoring China’s rampant pollution are not interested in the environment. They only want to punish America, and I will not stand for it.”
Duterte goes the China way
How did President Duterte conduct himself in such an occasion of — if it were worded in Filipino — dalawang nagbabanggaang bato (two colliding rocks)?
In fact, the President betrayed what he felt with his own statement: “When elephants fight, it is the grass that gets trampled flat.”
The problem with that analogy, however, is that the Philippines cannot be presumed to take the quality of grass in the confrontation. It is an elephant in his own right, only that it is small. But it is capable of growing.
But leave that to economists, which I am not, to pass judgment. I am only capable of keen observation of events, and in the speeches of the three, one thing is very noticeable. At least on two issues, President Duterte went the China way.
On the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, he had this to say: “The Philippines joined the Paris Agreement to fight climate change. We call on all parties, especially those who have not made good their commitment to fight climate change, to honor the same.
“We call on all parties to strengthen communities and peoples for preparedness and resilience. We are talking about mankind and Earth, our one and only home.”
And on the WHO so derided by Trump, Duterte found himself in agreement with Xi: “We call for a global health agenda with enough resources and policy space for the World Health Organization.
“We need a WHO that is quick to coordinate and quicker to respond. The Philippines will do its part in the pooling of global resources. Our health workers are among the best.”
Elephants, indeed, must have fought at the UNGA last week. But President Duterte did his damnedest best not to be the grass the giants were fighting on but rather to be an elephant himself, small maybe, but already learning the ropes of being a behemoth, too one day.
Source: Manila Times October 3, 2020