Mauro Gia Samonte
TOO much noise is being raised on the recent passage by the Standing Committee of the Chinese National Congress of a legislation authorizing the use of firepower by the Chinese coast guard against any aggressor in Chinese waters.
As could be expected, the raucous began with ranting from what have been already institutionalized as traditional US rah-rah boys.
First, the Philippine Daily Inquirer runs a story of a Filipino fisherman who alleged to have been blocked entry by a Chinese coast guard boat into a sandbar near the Pag-asa Island, an island in the Spratlys in the West Philippines Sea, that forms part of the municipality of Kalayaan in Palawan province. The Inquirer slants the story in its characteristic unabashed pro-US propagandist tone: “a display of Beijing’s continued assertion of its maritime agenda in the disputed waters.”
Then the Inquirer slant segues to a now run-of-the-mill chorus of traditional US chuwariwariwaps.
“This new law should be a concern to the Philippines,” the Inquirer quotes Jay Batongbacal.
“The exercise of the option to use force to implement their excessive claims in waters that rightfully belong to other countries under international law should be regarded as an act of aggression and unlawful use of force under the UN charter,” the quote added.
The Inquirer quotes former Foreign Affairs secretary Albert del Rosario: “[T]he new law [was] a sobering reminder to the world that China remains adamant in pressing its illegal claims in the South China Sea, now with force and probably with violence.”
“For Filipinos, this also reminds us that China’s plans to take over our waters and put our soldiers’ lives at risk will not go away despite the so-called friendly approach of the Duterte administration toward China,” the Inquirer quote adds.
Expect other true blue American mouthpieces to contribute their share in fanning the brouhaha for it to crescendo to a declaration on the issue by American Ambassador to the Philippines Sung Kim.
What appear worrisome in the current furor are the declarations of top government officials, like Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr., who flip-flopped on his earlier stand that the Chinese coast guard law is intrinsic to China’s right to protect its territory, and that at any rate internal to Chinese affairs which are not to be meddled upon by another country. Here are his exact words to that effect, as posted on his Twitter account.
“It’s none of our business; it is China’s business what laws it passes; so please a little self-restraint. I devised a visa rubber stamp that stamps most of the South China Sea and parts of North Borneo as our national territory and no one has complained. I forgot to include Guam.”
Quite shortly after, Teddy Boy’s aria took on discordant notes: “After reflection I fired a diplomatic protest. While enacting law is a sovereign prerogative, this one — given the area involved or for that matter the open South China Sea — is a verbal threat of war to any country that defies the law, which, if unchallenged, is submission to it.”
This logic of the Foreign secretary must falter. For don’t Filipinos have their own coast guard law whose coverage just happens to overlap with that covered by China’s own? If the Chinese coast guard law could be deemed a “verbal threat of war to any country that defies the law,” could not the Philippine coast guard law be deemed as carrying a similar threat to any country, let alone China, for perceived incursions into Philippine maritime territory? In fact, does not Locsin admit Philippine intrusion into other countries’ territories with the rubber stamp of the Department of Foreign Affairs as cited above?
It is interesting to note that when the first Philippine coast guard detachment was constituted at the start of the American occupation, it needed some 15 steamers to patrol the vast waters of the archipelago. Five of the 15 were provided by the Uraga Dock Company of Japan. And who provided the larger number of vessels which was 10?
China!
At a time when the Philippines thought of protecting its territorial waters by enacting and implementing a coast guard law, China wholeheartedly came to its assistance. Isn’t it just fair that now that China is embarking on a similar venture, the Philippines should honor it with reciprocal gesture?
Of course, who is the Philippines to pretend to render China any material support in this regard? What is required really is to hold high the good old Filipino value of utang na loob. Chinese aid to the Philippines has been immeasurable, both quantitatively and qualitatively over the past few years of the Duterte administration. It would be superfluous to enumerate them over and over again. Let us just cite the most recent one. During the visit of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi to the Philippines last January, he donated 500,000 doses of Sinovac to immunize Filipinos from the rampaging Covid-19 pandemic. That kind gesture, at a time when Western big pharmaceutical companies are competing for commercial advantages in dealing their own vaccines for purchase by the Philippine government.
In the current Chinese coast guard law controversy, no Chinese offense against the Philippines is at issue. Rather, it has given America one more occasion to rivet anti-Chinese sentiments among Filipinos. Question is, are we to bite this American bait one more time?