Try him too for crimes against sovereignty
Rodrigo Duterte will be remembered for surrendering Philippine sovereignty. This, while he undergoes trial for crimes against humanity.
Examples are many:
(1) Duterte booted the Philippine Air Force out of Sangley Base, August 2019.
On pretense of needing airstrips to decongest general aviation at nearby NAIA, he moved four PAF units to faraway Laguindingan field, Misamis Oriental. Manila Bay was left with scant air cover.
The 15th Strike Wing, 451st Supply Squadron, 570th Composite Tactical Wing and 1308th Dental Dispensary were promised facilities identical to what they vacated in Sangley. That never came true.
PAF lost quick access to the West Philippine Sea, which Duterte’s idol Xi Jinping was then aggressing. Airmen, ground crew and dependents lost supply, dental and housing access.
Laguindingan is in northeastern Mindanao, far from action against China trespass in Palawan’s Recto (Reed) Bank and Tawi-Tawi’s Sibutu Strait westside.
China People’s Liberation Army planes now routinely buzz those of the Philippine Coast Guard and fisheries bureau. In March 2024 a PLA attack helicopter deliberately hovered low at Sandy Cay, two nautical miles off Pag-asa Island, to fling sand and debris on Filipino marine scientists and endanger research divers.
(2) Duterte tried to also drive away the Philippine Navy from Sangley, September 2020.
Had he succeeded, PN’s air squadron, sealift, commandos, engineering, communications and other specialized units would have been dispersed to various islands.
Capital city Manila and seat of power Malacañang would have been exposed to enemy attack. PN officers and personnel would have lost their largest in-base housing.
Fortunately for the country, the PN brass stood fast against Duterte.
(3) Duterte favored the erection of a Sangley International Airport. Contractor: state-owned China Construction and Communication Corp.
CCCC was the enemy firm that landfilled and fortified Panganiban (Mischief), Kagitingan (Fiery Cross) and Zamora (Subi) Reefs in WPS, 1995-2013.
The World Bank had blacklisted CCCC and all subsidiaries for two years for bribery and faulty roadworks during Gloria Arroyo’s presidency. Duterte rehired it for reclamations in Davao and Cebu.
(4) When Filipinos resisted the Sangley airport plan, Duterte gave CCCC a reclamation project in Manila Bay.
After approving 42 other Manila Bay reclamations, Duterte kept claiming that he was against such projects.
(5) Duterte contracted onerous China loans, $211.2 million (P10.2 billion) for Kaliwa Dam and $62 million (P3 billion) for Chico River Irrigation and Wawa Dam rehab.
Terms are stiff: two percent annual interest, 0.3 percent annual commitment fee, $633,600 management fee and 20-year maturity with only seven years grace period.
Japan and Korea loans then had only 0.08 to 0.26 percent interest, 40 years to pay, with 10-12 years before start of principal payment.
In case of Philippine default, China will seize patrimonial assets, like oil- and gas-rich Recto.
Corruption-laden Kaliwa Dam will rise up to 72 meters high. A strong quake can collapse it and inundate three Quezon towns below – General Nakar, Infanta and Real. Six thousand indigenous folk never consented, as law requires.
(6) Duterte granted Xi Jinping fishing rights in WPS. No limit on volume, season, area.
Filipinos are bound by domestic and international laws against illegal, unreported, unregulated fishing. Parts of WPS are off-limits for two to four months per year. Shallow waters up to 30 kilometers from shore are reserved for artisanal fishers.
China Maritime Militia trawlers can haul in up to 76 tons of fish per day.
(7) Duterte abetted Chinese attacks on Philippine fishing boats.
During his term, he and security bootlickers hid from the public frequent Chinese machinegunning, water cannoning, ramming and menacing of Filipino fishers in Panatag (Scarborough) Shoal off Zambales.
He declared as an “ordinary sea accident” the June 2019 ramming by a CMM steel trawler of an anchored Filipino wooden craft at Recto. He downplayed the hit-and-run which threw 22 Filipino fishers into the cold night sea.
Self-respecting PCG, PN and Marine officers called it an international crime. Only the PCG commandant went along with Duterte’s subservience to Beijing.
(8) Duterte surrendered Sandy Cay to China in 2017.
He forbade AFP from securing the new island within Pag-asa’s 12-nautical mile territorial sea. Sandy Cay became a permanent hightide land mass when corals crushed during China’s reclamation of Kagitingan and Zamora accumulated at the sandbar.
China’s control of Sandy Cay threatens Pagasa’s civilian and military facilities.
(9) Duterte forbade joint patrols and exercises with defense ally US and European security partners.
(10) Duterte kept quiet when a Chinese frigate armed and aimed its weapons system at a PN patrol ship returning to base from Malampaya gas field in April 2020.
(11) Duterte allowed China military and research vessels to survey Benham Rise in the East Philippine Sea. Emboldened, China filed with the UN false ownership of five seabed features for supposedly being the first to give them Chinese names.
(12) Duterte allowed DITO telecoms, partly owned by China Telecom, to erect cell towers inside military camps, exposing the AFP to cyber espionage and sabotage.
(13) Duterte cronies invited two Chinese firms to take over Hanjin’s abandoned shipbuilding facility in Subic. Also for Chinese POGOs to occupy Grande and Chiquita Islands at the mouth of Subic Bay, and Fuga in the Babuyan Islands. PN and Marine officers resisted Beijing’s attempt to control Subic and Balintang Channel.
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