Acting Davao City Mayor Sebastian ‘Baste’ Duterte’s latest remarks mocking Filipinos who use ‘made in China’ products despite their negative sentiments with the country did not escape the attention of a Philippine Coast Guard official for the West Philippine Sea (WPS).
Responding to those who call him ‘pro-China’, Duterte said that Filipinos who don’t like Beijing should not use all made in China products ‘before you open your mouth.’
‘I’m leaning towards economic cooperation, not military practices,’ Duterte said in his podcast a few months ago which resurfaced online on Sunday.
Commodore Jay Tarriela, PCG spokesperson for the WPS affairs, said such remarks are fallacious.
‘Mayor Duterte’s suggestion that everyday Filipinos using Chinese-made goods (such as clothing or electronics) should somehow accept economic cooperation as a substitute for confronting China’s aggression in the WPS is a false equivalence,’ Tarriela said in a post on Facebook on Sunday.
‘Standing firm against China’s illegal claims and aggressive actions in the WPS is not an ‘either-or’ choice between commerce and confrontation,’ he added.
Tarriela also addressed this remark of Duterte, who said: ‘It’s not about us against China, because China will always be there, and the United States will always be there, they are the ones fighting, and both countries want control over this territory.’
‘His attribution of WPS conflicts to ‘great power competition’ between the U.S. and China oversimplifies the issue and absolves the aggressor,’ Tarriela said.
The PCG official noted that the tensions in WPS is a ‘direct result’ of China’s excessive maritime claims ‘long before any escalation in U.S. involvement.’
‘This is not a proxy war orchestrated by Washington; it is a violation of international law by Beijing,’ he also said.
Tarriela also said that despite President Rodrigo Duterte’s ‘overt courtship’ of China, its ‘bullying’ in WPS still persisted.
‘This history underscores that concessions do not yield peace; they invite further encroachments,’ Tarriela said.
Then-President Duterte pursued closer ties with China, a move later reversed by his successor Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
Marcos’ administration also greenlighted joint patrols and military exercises with the United States and other like-minded nations in the West Philippine Sea, allowed its oldest and only treaty ally access to four more military bases under the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, and the deployment of two American missile systems in northern Luzon.
These moves earned the ire of China.
Beijing claims sovereignty over almost the entire South China Sea but the landmark 2016 Arbitral Award effectively dismissed this, ruling heavily in favor of Manila’s sovereign rights.