Philippine foreign policy should be 'interdependent,' says analyst

MANILA, Philippines – The Duterte administration’s independent foreign policy should be reexamined or the Philippines will face its consequences in trickles, a political analyst said.

“Well unfortunately, the word 'independent' is, I think, not the proper word. It should be interdependent because he (President Rodrigo Duterte) himself said that we need to sell,” said Clarita Carlos, a political analyst at the University of the Philippines.

She explained the country needs to sell its commodities and services to its neighbors since the Philippines has exhausted its domestic market.

"That's why we go external. We go regional," said Carlos, citing the importance of working with major economic partners.

After arriving from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit last month, Duterte announced his plan to pursue an independent foreign policy for the Philippines.

“We will observe and I must insist, I repeat, I must insist on the time honored principles of sovereign equality, non-interference and commitment to peaceful settlements,” Duterte said.

While Carlos thinks that Duterte was “misadvised” and “misguided” about the country’s foreign policy and relations, she still believes that the president is still the best person to make a judgment.

“I suppose what is coming out of his mouth are declarations which he had thought about and not just outburst, and let us just make sure that we know the consequences intended or unintended of all this,” the political analyst said.

“It has been said often enough that you don't need to move away from another country across the Pacific Ocean to move nearer across the South China Sea and further north to reach you know, which country we're talking about,” she added.

Duterte has decided to become more cordial with China, but not without putting the country’s relations with the US at risk.

The president even claimed that its traditional ally has manipulated the foreign exchange rate to weaken the peso to a seven-year low against the dollar, which his budget chief Benjamin Diokno later on rebutted.

The political analyst warned of possible consequences of the president’s pronouncements which the Philippines in general might end up regretting in the future.

“If I may give some unsolicited advice and it is not just for the chief executive but for all those agencies which are headed by new people. Please take time to study, please be prudent in your decisions,” Carlos said.