Human rights groups around the world have condemned Duterte’s controversial war on drugs, which has also embittered the Philippines’ historically warm ties with the West. Yet, the tough-talking Duterte has progressively solicited the assistance of Western partners, particularly that of Washington and Canberra, against the burgeoning threat of the so-called Islamic State (IS) in his home island of Mindanao.
For the past three months, IS-affiliated groups have managed to lay siege on Marawi, the Philippines’ largest Muslim-majority city, providing a blueprint for Jihadist-extremist groups around the region. The prospect of an IS Wilayat (governorate) — otherwise known as a ‘distant caliphate’ — in Southeast Asia has gained greater pungency than ever before.
As a result, both the United States and Australia face the classic dilemma of cooperating with unsavoury allies in order to stem a greater threat. Under Duterte’s watch, the Philippines is confronting the twin threat of terror and anarchy, with a potentially disastrous impact on its fragile, fledgling democracy.
Throughout the first half of 2017, Duterte was forced to recalibrate his bloody crackdown on suspected drug dealers. This was largely due to the suspected murders of provincial mayor Rolando Espinosa and South Korean businessman Jee Ick-joo by members of the Philippine National Police.
Their deaths provoked widespread condemnation from the business community as well as some of Duterte’s key allies in the senate, who launched a series of high-profile investigations that exposed the innermost flaws of Philippine law enforcement agencies. No less than South Korean President Moon Jae-in, then as opposition leader, weighed in, expressing outrage at how ‘the murder was committed within the police headquarters’ and accusing Duterte of committing ‘diplomatic disrespect’ for not sacking responsible officials.
In response, Duterte made a rare statement of apology, stating how he was ‘very sorry that it had to happen’ and reassuring Seoul that ‘those responsible are known to us already and they will go to prison and I will see to it that they will be sentenced to the maximum’. He temporarily suspended police operations and even suggested using the (presumably more reliable) military for anti-drug operations instead. Over the succeeding months, the Filipino leader focused on international diplomacy, infrastructure development and counter-terrorism in Mindanao.
But in recent weeks there has been another sudden spike in drug-related killings at the hands of law enforcement agencies. In early August, anti-drug raids claimed the lives of 91 suspected drug users in Manila and the neighbouring region of Bulacan alone. Just days earlier, another raid led to the gruesome death of 14 individuals in Ozamiz, including the mayor Reynaldo ‘Aldong’ Parojinog and his wife Susan. The President was visibly pleased, describing the spate of killings as ‘beautiful’.
But the suspected murder of a teenager Kian Loyd delos Santos by police officers, which was caught on a nearby CCTV camera, provoked nationwide outrage. In response, a subdued Duterte expressed profound regret and (once again) promised to hold erring law enforcers accountable. He also met the family of the slain teenager to mollify public outrage.
Despite this, it is unlikely that Duterte will shift gears in his war on drugs, which enjoys the support of most of the population. He will likely focus more on high-value targets and make cosmetic reforms to avoid heart-wrenching casualties — especially among minors. Meanwhile, he can count on continued external support amid the ongoing campaign against IS elements in Mindanao.
In fact, diplomatic ties seem to be warming up. A confident Duterte has claimed that in recent months he has rarely discussed human rights concerns with Western leaders, including Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop. According to the Filipino President, the White House even supports his anti-drug campaign.
In early August, Duterte held an unusually affable meeting with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who barely touched on human rights issues and instead focused on expanding counter-terrorism cooperation. Weeks later, the Philippine government publicised a ‘highly unusual’ and controversial photo showing the Filipino President and the highly reclusive Australian spy chief Nick Warner posing with a signature ‘Duterte fist’.
Both Washington, as a treaty ally, and Canberra, which has a Status of Forces Agreement with Manila, have pledged or already deployed troops, intelligence, weapons and surveillance equipment to Duterte’s counter-terror efforts. The Pentagon is even considering direct military involvement in the anti-IS operations in Mindanao.
Once again, Western capitals have found themselves in a tough bind, shedding deepening concerns over human rights issues in exchange for counter-terror cooperation with neo-authoritarian leaders. The ultimate victim is no less than Philippine democracy, where erratic and centralised leadership is undermining the rule of law.
Richard Javad Heydarian is Manila-based academic and author of The Rise of Duterte: A Populist Revolt Against Elite Democracy.
If the conflict in Mindanao is about countering terrorism, where is the assistance from fellow members of ASEAN such as Indonesia and Malaysia ?
This would help counter any propaganda that foreign assistance are crusaders seeking to repress a muslim majority province.
I fear a quagmire in Mindanao and I doubt assistance from Western countries will significantly improve the situation.
This is also an interesting piece but readers should know that the Philippines is the “sick man” of East Asia and one of the poorest to boot, after 425 years of egregious colonization, first by Spain (1521 to 1898), then by the United States (1898 to 1941), then by Japan from 1941 to 1945 before gaining her independence in July 1946. In those brutal colonial periods the Philippines had no real democracy.
To exacerbate the problems and accelerate the descent into abject poverty, many of the post-colonial Presidents, their administrations and their landed-gentry cronies and courts were extremely corrupt.
Today, President Duterte is the only hope for the Philippines to pull herself up by the bootstraps. He is determined to reverse the culture of corruption, drugs, chaos and abject poverty in the Philippines and bring prosperity to the people.
But he is weighed down by two wars: a wasteful war against IS, which is probably now Western-sponsored to take him down and a war on drugs, a deadly cancer in the Filipino society, affecting millions.
In any war there will be collateral damage and recently a teenager was tragically killed by bad elements in the police force. The writer is right to mention that it is unlikely “Duterte will shift gears in his war on drugs, which enjoys the support of most of the population.
Few people can recall or know that over 200,000 Filipino patriots were killed by the better-armed American invaders in 1898, when Spain ceded the Philippines to the United States, without consulting the Philippines, after the Spanish-American War.
And during the Battle of Manila fought from 24 September 1762 to 6 October 1762, between Britain and Spain thousands of innocent Filipinos were killed. The British won, leading to 24 months of occupation. Once Manila fell, British troops “turned to pillage” like they shamelessly did to the treasures in China after British and French troops destroyed the Old Summer Palace (Yuan Ming Yuan) in 1860.
During the Japanese invasion and also disgraceful colonization from 1941 to 1945, cities such as Manila (arguably the second most destroyed Allied city in WWII) were reduced to rubble.
By the time war ended in 1945, an estimated 1,000,000 Filipinos were killed because of indiscriminate bombings by Japanese bombers, unspeakable atrocities by Japanese troops, of which 131,028 Filipinos were listed as killed in 72 war crime events.
Tens of thousands of young Filipino women were kidnapped and forced to serve Japanese troops as sex slaves, a crime against humanity Japan also committed in Korea, China, Malaya, Indonesia and other parts of Asia but still refuses to admit, compensate and apologise, even though today Japan claims to be a Western Liberal Democracy.
So how is the Philippines able to rise from the ‘ashes’ of four centuries of Western colonization and invasions, like China did in 38 years to become the 2nd largest economy in the world (largest on a PPP basis) and the world’s largest trading nation?
In my view, the Philippine should seriously take heed of the wise economic principle articulated by Mr Bill Buckley, the retired Australian publisher of an economic newsletter:
“Capital is the real economic foundation of any economy. It is Capital – all the productive tools, equipment, well established farms, etc. – which ensures the arrival of the consumer goods next week or next month or next year. Note carefully here that it is not more “money” that all third world economies really need – it is more Capital. It is not because of any perceived insufficiency of quantities of money that third world economies have dismal standards of living. If that was the problem, then any nation could instantly become immensely rich in REAL terms simply by printing huge amounts of “money”.”
How can the Philippines acquire the ‘Capital’ to escape the abject poverty that grips the country today? It is definitely not by printing more paper “money” which will only lead to hyperinflation or by aligning with her former colonial masters, the United States, which will bring more bombs and endless wars.
With an alignment with China and Russia, the Philippines will prosper as they will bring in ‘Capital’, investments in new infrastructures, high speed trains, hospitals, schools, universities, malls, industrial parks and the creation of millions of high-paid jobs to produce consumer goods for local consumption and export.
If requested, I am sure China and Russia can help President Duterte end the rebellion in the Mindanao.
Therefore, let us not underestimate President Rodrigo Duterte. As a former lawyer and prosecutor, he is a lot smarter than most of his predecessors. He also intuitively knows which country can be trusted and which cannot.
He told Russian media ahead of his visit to Moscow in May this year that “I have nothing against America but my foreign policy has shifted. I want to deal with China and Russia, because in (the) Western world, it’s double talk.”