President Rodrigo Roa Duterte and President Xi Jinping of People’s Republic of China pose for a photo prior to their expanded bilateral meeting at the Malacañan Palace on November 20, 2018. (Presidential photo)
Former president Rodrigo Duterte should be sweating bullets by now after his friend, Chinese President Xi Jinping, disclosed the contents of the “gentleman’s agreement” between them in 2016 that recognized China’s control of the territorial sea and airspace over Scarborough Shoal.
While Duterte spoke consistently that his gentleman’s agreement with Xi only covered the status quo, which meant both sides would not move to construct fortifications and increase naval and Coast Guard presence around the shoal, he did not admit that he agreed with China’s insistence that the Philippines recognize the territorial sea and airspace that Beijing is entitled to in the shoal. Yet, he has not accused China of lying on this inasmuch as China had already lost any historical or legal claim to Scarborough Shoal based on the July 12, 2016 award to the Philippines by the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague.
In fact, Duterte followed Xi’s lead by dumping the award into the trash can. This is the only case in PCA’s history when a winning party refused to invoke its judicial triumph and assert its sovereignty over Scarborough Shoal. This is the only case in PCA’s history when a losing party refused to acknowledge a decision that is valid and enforceable since it is the body charged with deciding on disputes among signatories to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS.)
Xi was so pleased with the gratuitous actions of Duterte in 2016 that he offered Duterte a 60:40 deal for the exploration of oil and gas in an area that is within the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of the Philippines. The offer was revealed by Duterte himself in an article written by Helen Regan of CNN on Sept. 12, 2019. This strange admission worsens the mortal sins of Duterte as the Xi offer was premised on his repudiating the arbitral award, which makes it a corrupt proposition unacceptable to any Philippine leader sworn to protect, promote and defend the national interest. Who is Xi to offer a 60:40 oil and gas exploration deal for a venture within the country’s EEZ? Why would Duterte contemplate on swallowing Xi’s guff since it was obviously a ploy to encroach on Philippine territory?
This brings us right smack to the latest China misadventure on the “temporary special arrangement” that Duterte willingly bit in his apocryphal journey to prevent war from breaking out between the Philippines and China and guarantee that Filipino fishermen could have their daily catch in Panatag Shoal, as they had in the past 10 centuries. Moreover, the shoal lies within the 200-mile Philippine EEZ and nearly 1,000 kilometers from Hainan, a legitimate Chinese province. To retired Supreme Court (SC) senior associate justice Antonio T. Carpio, the “temporary special arrangement” has serious implications” as it whittles away Philippine sovereignty over a maritime feature where China is a squatter.
Duterte did yield on the most precious sovereignty issue by agreeing that our Navy and Coast Guard would not enter the 12-nautical mile imaginary territorial sea, as well as the imaginary territorial airspace, of Scarborough Shoal. Carpio said Duterte also waived the right of poor Filipino fishermen to fish within the lagoon of Scarborough Shoal, a traditional fishing right recognized in the arbitral award. Carpio insisted that Duterte has no power to waive, even temporarily, Philippine sovereignty or traditional Filipino fishing rights “unless the waiver is embodied in a treaty ratified by the Senate.” To Carpio, Duterte’s waivers are void “because these were done without fully informing Congress and the Filipino people.”
Carpio said the acts of Duterte “caused undue injury to poor Filipino fishermen and to the Government through Duterte’s gross, inexcusable negligence or evident bad faith. There is gross inexcusable negligence because the waivers clearly violated the Constitution. There is evident bad faith because Duterte did not fully disclose these waivers of sovereignty and traditional fishing rights to Congress and the Filipino people.”
Duterte must be George Costanza personified, a TV character who famously said “it’s not a lie if you believe it,” and he will continue to believe only the fairy tales that he had spun. To him and Xi, everything is interpretation because truth is an illusion, a dogma promoted by Nietzsche, who eventually up in an asylum as he doubted even his own existence. Duterte has used as bogey his imagined “imminent” war with China to justify all the shady deals that he and his Chinese valets and advisers had cut with Xi and his cronies, and all of them spell disaster to 112-million Filipinos, including himself. (DEO MAGNO)
