MOST Filipinos trust the United States and are neutral on China, a new survey by Social Weather Stations showed.
The pollster’s December 2017 survey showed that 75 percent of the Filipinos it polled said they had “much trust” in the United States compared with the 14 other countries included in the poll.
That was equivalent to a “very good” net trust rating of +68 for the US, which was followed by Canada and Japan in the ratings.
The leaders of the three countries visited Manila last year for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit.
SWS said the public trust survey results on the United States, a long-time Philippine ally, had been positive since the country was first included in its polls in December 1994.
The US continued to hold a positive impression among Filipinos despite President Rodrigo Duterte’s tirades over the American officials’ criticism of his war on illegal drugs and the atrocities against Filipinos during World War II.
US President Donald Trump hailed the long-standing ties between the Philippines and the US during his visit to Manila in November.
While the Philippines’ bilateral ties with China have warmed up under the Duterte administration, the majority of Filipinos who participated in the survey said they felt neutral about the country.
SWS said China’s trust ratings among Filipinos went up by a grade from poor to neutral, rising by 20 points from the -13 rating it had in September 2017.
The pollster said the net trust in China had been positive in only nine out of 45 surveys since it first included it in its polls in August 1994.
“It reached as high as a moderate +17 in June 2010 and as low as a bad -46 in September 2015,” SWS said.
Manila and Beijing began regular consultations last year even as the Chinese government continued to ignore an international tribunal’s July 2016 ruling that invalidated its claim over nearly all of the South China Sea.
But the Duterte administration has been pursuing stronger trade ties with China, downplaying the tensions over the South China Sea.
The other countries that Filipinos feel neutral about are Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos.
The countries moderately trusted by Filipinos are Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Brunei and Vietnam.
Although the trust rating for North Korea has improved, it is still the most distrusted country by Filipinos.
The net trust rating of Pyongyang stayed poor at -19 even as it increased by nine points from -28 in September 2017, SWS said.
The pollster said that since it began surveying public trust in North Korea in March 2003, its net trust rating had always been negative, ranging from a bad -34 in May 2012 to a neutral -5 in March 2017.
Last year, Duterte described North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as a “fool” and a “son of a bitch” over its nuclear program.