Read the room, Harry Roque

Palace “Pinocchio” Harry Roque was at it again, shilling for the Duterte administration and spewing all kinds of malarkey as if the Filipino people are so dumb as to take everything he says hook, line, and sinker. In the news item, “Diplomacy is still best in maritime dispute with China, Palace says,” (5/3/21), Roque pontificated that his boss “knows that, as a responsible member of the world community, the Philippines must pursue its claims by legal and diplomatic means.”

Remonstrating against retired Supreme Court justice Antonio Carpio and former foreign secretary Albert del Rosario for “misleading and endangering our people with illegal, impractical, and irresponsible statements” regarding the West Philippine Sea issues, the truth-twisting sycophant par excellence had the gall to lecture the real experts that only President Duterte has “the foresight, information, and constitutional mandate to make sound foreign policy decisions”—despite all perceptions of his gross ignorance and incompetence.

Roque could not even read the room. Carpio and Del Rosario were just urging the government to pursue our victory against China at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague by “seeking the support of Western nations” or submitting the matter “before the UN General Assembly to compel China to abide by the rule of law.” Obviously, in Roque’s convoluted thinking, Mr. Duterte’s “diplomacy” could only involve begging for “mercy” from Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Come 2022, do Filipinos really want more of Mr. Duterte’s mendicancy toward China and—God forbid—Roque’s bare-faced mendacity?

GEORGE DEL MAR
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