Bitter fruits of Duterte’s China embrace

Unrequited Love: Duterte’s China Embrace” by Marites Dañguilan Vitug and Camille Elemia (Ateneo University Press, 2024) is not a bitter-sweet story about a lovelorn politico from a banana republic told with allegorical flourish. It is a horror investigative story backed by research, interviews, voluminous documents, published and broadcast news reports that show how an elected president had flung his sovereign nation into the arms of a covetous bully nation across the West Philippine Sea (WPS). At what cost? What had we lost?

In her back cover blurb, Sen. Risa Hontiveros does not mince words: “A damning record of the former president’s long-running relationship with China, [the book] makes a case for Rodrigo Duterte’s betrayal of the Filipino people.”

In her preface, Dañguilan Vitug’s states the whys: “Where was Duterte coming from? How did he demonstrate his affection for China and how was this reciprocated? What was the impact of this pendulum swing on sectors such as the military and the defense and foreign affairs departments, institutions that had clear geostrategic moorings? What did this mean for the rule of law and our maritime dispute with China?”

The book exposes the overt and covert maneuvers of an Asian bully nation, enabled and emboldened by a China-smitten Filipino president, to aggressively intrude into not only Philippine geographical territory but into other aspects of Philippine life—politics, the military, economics, media, communications, infrastructure, culture, name it.

Public officials, government bureaucrats, think tanks, patriotic garden-variety sleuths and citizens who care about this country’s future should read the book and then act and be vigilant. Warning: On the cover is a doppelganger.

Here was a national leader enamored with the leader of another nation (China) he put his own at a disadvantage while bad-mouthing a long-time ally (the United States of America) for personal reasons that I may describe as fits of childish pique and disaffection (Chapter 1, “Roots of Affection”).

Duterte’s amorous protestations in 2018: “I just simply love Xi Jinping. He understands my position and he is willing to help … More than anybody else at this time of our national life, I need China.” In 2019: “I love China.”

Thus his “pivot toward China” declared in the early days of his presidency. Thus began the Philippines’ descent into a bottom corner of the relationship. The word “unrequited” means that “love” is lopsided if not exploitative, leaving the pursuing lover’s people in a position of weakness that has yet to be reversed.

Divided into six parts of 16 chapters, “Unrequited Love” chronicles how the descent worsened with the COVID-19 pandemic and the Duterte government’s shameless favoring of China-made vaccines and health equipment that made local manufacturers cry out for help. Soon the corrupt Pharmally deal was uncovered and so was the Chinese matrix of allies, cronies, and scoundrels salivating for quick bucks. That was the tip of the iceberg.

There were the China-financed mega projects in Duterte’s “Build, build, build” program, among them, the Chico River irrigation project in Kalinga despite red flags from the Commission on Audit, and the Kaliwa Dam that would adversely affect indigenous communities in Quezon and Rizal. These looked like a perfect fit in China’s Belt and Road Initiative, a global showcase that snared countries into a web of indebtedness and an altered state of katangahan. Read about “the bridges over troubled waters” and projects that went pffft. Read about how Chinese tycoons built massive drug rehab centers to complement Duterte’s dirty drug war, only for these to be declared near useless by experts.

If you are wondering why the hundreds of Philippine offshore gaming operators (Pogos) that have sprouted, spawned crimes, and become suspected hubs of China espionage are not tackled in “Unrequited Love” it is because the book is mainly about Duterte’s foreign policy shift. A book on Pogos, anyone?

A chapter of high interest to me was about how media practitioners of good and bad standing were also being snared into the Chinese scheme. Travels, scholarships, wine-and-dine enticements until some media people, bloated and MSG-loaded, have become China’s mouthpieces themselves. This is a major, scary issue, if you ask me, especially when seen in the context of the entry of Chinese telecommunications corporations getting a slice of the pie in the sky, our sky. And gaining foothold near military facilities at that.

Expectedly, several chapters are devoted to the flashpoint that is the WPS where firepower reigns supreme, where David-and-Goliath skirmishes unfold almost daily since Duterte belittled the much-hailed 2016 arbitral ruling that favored the Philippines’ territorial claims as “a mere scrap of paper.” Nations will be watching how the Philippines will rise or sink, its allies notwithstanding.

“Unrequited Love” is a heartbreaking reportage about a country that was fed into the maw of a fire-breathing dragon.

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