We are all familiar with the line “less talk, less mistakes; more talk, more mistakes.”
This in gist was what administration ally Senator Dick Gordon was trying to tell President Duterte. Senator Gordon is not the only one who wants the President to be more circumspect with his utterances. The whole nation does. The problem that this is causing is totally unnecessary.
The President, however, keeps on plodding along. He seems totally aware of the repercussions of what he is doing, yet he continues to use the same expletives and profane language. As he said, he has not trained to be a statesman and would rather leave that to others.
So, why does he continue doing it? Does he have a hidden purpose? Maybe he is doing it to provoke an aggressive response from the United States so he will have a reason to really break from it and embrace China. His tilt towards our giant neighbor is too obvious that this might be the reason why his Special Envoy to China, former President Fidel Ramos canceled a planned trip there. It might be that FVR sees no point anymore. After all, President Duterte is already doing the job himself and there is no more need for negotiations.
What happens to the decision issued by the Permanent Court of Arbitration now? Will the Philippines, for which the decision was made, set it aside thereby giving China a great diplomatic victory? I have no personal knowledge as to why our President is so antagonistic towards the United States but one friend related to me an incident when President Duterte was mayor of Davao. It seems that an American treasure hunter caused an explosion in his hotel room that caused the amputation of one of his legs. While still recuperating in a hospital, a private jet landed in Davao and spirited the man away, thereby avoiding investigation. This, I was told, got Duterte fuming mad. It seemed to him that the Americans can do anything they want in this country.
I could not confirm whether the story is true or not. But it appears that the animosity started way back. In spite of the President’s rhetoric, however, the US continues to issue statements to the effect that US-Philippine relationship is ironclad. The ongoing war games will not be the last after all. This is because in planning these war games, one does not only plan for one but also the next one. It is my understanding that the next game which will be next year is already the subject of planning from both sides.
What we should watch out is at what stage the rhetoric of the President starts to bite into the relationship. The President’s men cannot keep on contradicting him and issuing clarificatory statements. On the US side, sooner or later, the State Department and the White House will also run out of statements to explain President Duterte’s tirades. The US side has lately been referring to the favorable rating of the US by Filipinos —about 85 percent. It is a rating that is even higher than the way Americans view their own country. To the US, this probably is a huge anchor and rightly so if they are not dealing with a President named Duterte.
At what point, will one side blink? I do not think President Duterte will because he probably has made up his mind to chart a tectonic foreign policy shift. Whether the whole nation realizes it or not, we are witnessing a monumental event in our foreign relations that could change our historical relationship with the country that gave us our democratic traditions.
* * *
Senator Leila de Lima has been increasingly showing erratic behavior in the Senate hearing. There could be two explanations here. One is that she is under severe emotional stress due to the psychological warfare being wage by the administration or that she is vying for a FAMAS award for her acting abilities because she has something to hide.
As an old goat in the police service, I am betting on the latter. As a lawyer, she knows pretty well that whoever loses his or her cool first loses the ballgame. In other words, her emotional outbursts are just for show. They are not genuine. Putting aside the issue of vigilante killings in the anti-drug campaign which should be condemned and properly investigated by the Police, the Duterte administration has barely scratched the surface when it comes to unmasking corrupt government officials who have lined their pockets with money coming from the drug trade.
Uncover this and more than half the battle is won. Killing the small traders and users will not eradicate the problem. On the contrary, finding those high government officials who protect the drug lords in exchange for money will drastically reduce the problem.
The President said he will be coming out with another batch of names. Hopefully, this time, the names would be vetted properly to avoid another round of apologies from the President. The key to this as I was reliably informed can be found in the National Penitentiary which was the center of the drug trade in the last administration.
Although the President already said that he would not talk to criminals, he probably should reconsider and listen to what Jaybee Sebastian, for instance, has to say. Who knows, he might hit the mother lode of information.
In the last public statement of the President, he said that criminality had gone down by 50 percent. Does this now mean that the state of lawlessness and emergency can now be lifted?