Road to partnership

So far, so good. As President Aquino embarks on his four-day state visit to China, the two countries, of late engaged in a word war over competing claims to the Spratly Islands, have struck the right notes of warmth and cordiality to set the mood, so to speak. Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Liu Jianchao has written Mr. Aquino an effusive letter welcoming him to his home country and predicting that Mr. Aquino’s visit “would mark a new beginning of refreshed endeavor to bring China-Philippines relations to a new high.”

Malacañang and the Department of Foreign Affairs, for their part, have taken pains to tamp down any talk of tension between the two countries, saying that the Spratlys dispute “is not the sum total of Philippines-China relations.” President Aquino has even gone so far as to liken the two countries’ recent troubled relations to that of a married couple. “Perhaps I can use the analogy of marriage. It is said that there are couples who have been together 50 years and they are still getting to know each other. So, perhaps the conflicts provide an opportunity to have the test that makes for a stronger relationship.”

Would that all these buoyant diplomatic niceties, and Mr. Aquino’s folksy reassurances, translate to a successful state visit by the President. One that not only ends up bringing in the economic rewards of ramped-up Chinese investments in the Philippines but, more significantly for this country’s frayed nerves, also gives Mr. Aquino and his advisers valuable, clarifying insight on how China actually wishes to proceed on the thorny question of the Spratlys.

Because, if Mr. Aquino had only pursued his novel line of thought that the Philippines and its giant neighbor are indeed akin to a married couple that’s given to the normal—even beneficial—squabble every now and then, he’d have arrived at some nettlesome conclusions. First, for a healthy marriage to thrive, one partner can’t bully the other around, or resolve problems by flexing bare brawn. Mutual respect is the foundation of any sound relationship—a willingness, at the very least, to consider the other’s point of view soberly and openly, without resort to threat, bluster or intimidation.

In interviews with media, Mr. Aquino has often come across as an off-the-cuff, even blunt, speaker, eager to share his thoughts in as plain a manner as possible. For this trip, before the powerful officialdom of a country that puts a premium on the appearance of courtesy, ritual and public honor, he would need all the diplomatic restraint he can muster to be able to speak delicately, but with unmistakable resolve, about how China has behaved rather gracelessly toward the Philippines and its Spratlys claim.

When it was recently reported, for instance, that the Philippines had built shelter for its troops on one of the islands, China’s response, through its main Communist Party paper People’s Daily, seemed unnecessarily harsh and belligerent. “Some countries will pay for misjudging China’s sovereignty,” it said. In addition, “Manila obviously lacks the sincerity to peacefully address the South China Sea issue.”

A statement, to say the least, that takes some good amount of gall to say, China itself having unilaterally built much bigger structures on the disputed islands, from which its sea patrols have reportedly harassed Filipino vessels and fishermen in the area. And while it has declared that the dispute should be settled peacefully, through the give-and-take of diplomacy, it has adamantly refused any form of international arbitration on the issue, even as it has dramatically stoked tensions in the region with incendiary warnings against other claimant nations, backed up by palpable displays of naval force such as the recent launch of its first aircraft carrier.

The centuries of affinity and attachment that have undergirded relations between the Filipino and Chinese peoples should provide a measure of optimism that the two countries, for all the rash talk, would eventually reach a sort of detente on the issue; and from there, a viable resolution that would allow each party to leave the negotiating table with its sense of national pride and honor intact.

But for this to happen, Mr. Aquino, representing a country that is no match to China militarily but certainly its equal in patriotic fervor, must urge, forcefully if need be, greater transparency and clarity of intention on the part of its government. Communication, after all, is one other key to a good and lasting partnership.