Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is in the country, pledging billions of dollars in aid to the Philippines and promising to create more business opportunities through development assistance and private investments.
The help will come in the form of infrastructure projects. There is no arguing we need such projects to improve mobility and to provide jobs for the people.
The visit’s primary agenda is business. “The bottom line of this announcement is that Japan is very eager of this cooperation for the business and the economic development of the Philippines by utilizing all those available resources,” Foreign Press Secretary Yasuhisa Kawamura said.
It is comforting that Tokyo and Manila appear headed toward a long and fruitful partnership despite the fact that the latter seems to have cozied up to China, with which the former has a territorial dispute.
We have a territorial dispute with China, too, and we have had an initial victory in the form of a favorable ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague. Alas, President Duterte does not seem keen on reminding the Chinese of that anytime soon.
But at the risk of dampening the warm and friendly mood brought by Prime Minister Abe’s visit and consequent goodwill, we venture to ask: What, now, of the Filipino women who were turned into sexual slaves during World War II?
Early in 2016, Japan and South Korea (another country whose women were made into slaves) announced an agreement where Japan would issue a formal apology to the South Korean women, with commensurate payment. “The Government of Japan will now take measures to heal psychological wounds of all former comfort women through its budget,” the agreement read in part.
In contrast, nothing decisive has been done for the Filipino comfort women. A group of them sought relief from the Supreme Court and said top government leaders committed grave abuse of discretion by not espousing their claims for official apology and other forms of reparation from the Japanese government.
In April 2010, the high court said the women’s petition had no merit because “from a domestic law perspective, the Executive Department has the exclusive prerogative to determine whether to espouse petitioners’ claims against Japan.” The court also said that the Philippines is “not under any international obligation to espouse the petitioners’ claims.”
And then there was the plagiarism scandal that eclipsed the ignominy of the decision.
Nothing more was heard about the women. Not after the decision was handed down, not now.
It does not help that President Duterte has uttered many things that give away his views on women. But he is also known for being spontaneous, and a champion of the downtrodden. Those who are still alive among the women are very old and very sick. Who will speak for them? Will there still be no pledge to do them justice, even at this late hour?