It should be interesting to see how Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. reconciles his view that Manila should protest China's establishment of a maritime rescue center in the Kagitingan or Fiery Cross Reef—if its construction is verified—against the Palace view that we should be “thankful” for the help that such a facility would bring.
Secretary Locsin stands on firm legal ground, of course. After all, the Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) ruled in 2016 that China's claims in the West Philippine Sea are excessive, and that the contested reef is well within the Philippines' exclusive economic zone. This would suggest that any structures the Chinese build on those reefs and any artificial islands it creates would violate our sovereign rights.
But the thinking in the Palace has been focused on appeasement, not confrontation, in the belief that the Philippines can gain more from our powerful northern neighbor if we play nice and keep silent while it does whatever it wants on our territory.
On the day the UN tribunal issued its decision, the Foreign Affairs secretary at the time—not Locsin—showed little enthusiasm and called for “restraint and sobriety,” for fear that any sign of elation at our hard-earned legal victory would provoke and antagonize Beijing.
In November 2018, presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo said the PCA was “useless” for now because there was no way to enforce the decision.
Then, this month, the same spokesman said the Philippines should be “thankful” for the rescue center that China claims tohave built on Kagitingan Reef.
“Maybe we should be thankful,” the spokesman said, when asked about China's latest action. “Personally, I don’t think establishing a distress center is bad, even in whose territory. It will be helping everybody in distress,” he said.
Taken to task by the opposition for speaking like a puppet of China, Panelo bristled, saying we should be thankful only if three conditions were met: 1) that China had informed the Philippine government; 2) that China had sought permission from the Philippines; and 3) that the construction of the maritime rescue center was not a ruse.
His explanation gave us pause. Is it possible that China had informed the Philippine government and sought its permission to build the rescue center—unbeknownst to the Palace or the Department of Foreign Affairs? If Beijing had indeed done so, would Panelo—and Secretary Locsin—not have immediately said the center had the Philippine government's blessing?
None of the legalistic splitting of hairs from the Palace can hide the obvious obsequiousness that passes for diplomacy these days. We look forward to a day when the Foreign secretary can truly speak for all Filipinos who believe it is never all right for “friends” to trample on our rights, no matter how “helpful” they may seem.