Last week, we heard of the changing of the guards at the Department of National Defense (DND), with the announcement of Gilberto “Gibo” Teodoro as the newly appointed DND secretary. I wonder where OIC Secretary Charlie Galvez Jr. will be placed, or will he go back to his former post? He used to be the head honcho of the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation, and Unity, formerly the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process.
I also am eager to find out how the newly appointed DND head will handle our still contentious relationship with China over the West Philippine Sea.
But Secretary Teodoro is not new to this kind of job. He held this position 16 years ago, and at that time, he was the youngest to have served this high and quite sensitive position under the presidency of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. He finished his Bachelor of Law degree at the University of the Philippines in 1989 and became that year’s bar topnotcher. He also holds a Master of Laws degree from the prestigious Harvard University.
In a statement, the Armed Forces of the Philippines welcomed this development of putting a “regular” DND secretary after two retired generals held it as the department’s “caretakers” — retired Gen. Jose Faustino Jr., then Senior Undersecretary Galvez, who served for more than five months until Teodoro’s appointment was announced early this month. According to the AFP spokesperson, Col. Medel Aguilar, Teodoro’s “decisive leadership, professional competence, and wealth of experience” will serve the country best, especially in its continuing efforts to beef up its national security and of its territorial integrity vis-à-vis China’s claims in the West Philippine Sea (WPS).
Teodoro is expected to pursue President Marcos’ marching orders of not “losing an inch” of Philippine territory in the WPS.
But will Teodoro’s unblemished public service record and defense expertise serve him well in the face of all these tensions in the WPS, in addition to the current levels of insecurity of communities at the barangay level in many parts of the country?
Perhaps in matters of defense and protecting our rights as a sovereign country that has been awarded the 2016 arbitration ruling in the case against China’s illegal incursion to Philippine waters, he may be successful. For starters, he can actually put to force what former DND OIC Secretary Galvez has so eloquently defended during a recent forum in Singapore, to exhort all his counterparts in the Southeast Asian countries to uphold the rule of law in the WPS. He can use his expertise to collaborate with the other SEA countries to enforce the 2016 arbitration ruling to prevent China from further bullying countries like the Philippines.
But the main question is the level of resolve at the chief executive level—that of the current President, who seems to have a nebulous foreign defense policy and of other key national policies as well.
For instance, Mr. Marcos is more passionate about the urgency of the passage of the contentious Maharlika Investment Fund (MIF) bill, and of other measures to launder his family’s reputation during his presidency. You can list all the things he is pushing now—all used to be flagship programs during his father’s term (the Kadiwa centers, Masagana 99 program, etc.). I am not surprised at all why the proposed ill-conceived sovereign wealth fund has to be called Maharlika—it reminds me eerily of the dictator’s and his wife’s unabashed myth about their being “chosen,” to become leaders of this country. Remember the biographical film, “Iginuhit ng Tadhana”?
Upholding the rule of law is meaningless in a country where such a principle of democracy is observed more in the breach than compliance.
Perhaps there are several levels of upholding the rule of law? We invoke it in the face of a more powerful country bullying us with its incursions into our territories. But on our national front, the rule of law is always sidelined, by acts of impunity by no less than those who are in power to find ways to skirt the law, or worse, to circumvent it.