Palace: China must prove itself trustworthy

MANILA, Philippines — It’s up to China to prove itself a trustworthy friend of the Philippines where the United States – the Asian power’s top regional rival – remains the most trusted country.

Presidential spokesman Harry Roque made the remarks yesterday in reaction to results of a Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey conducted last December showing the US as still the country most trusted by Filipinos, followed by Canada and Japan.

China, embroiled in a territorial row with the Philippines over the West Philippine Sea, was the third least trusted by Filipinos after Laos and North Korea, the same survey showed.

Asked if the Duterte administration would do something to improve Filipinos’ perception of China, Roque replied: “Perhaps it would be up to China. If they fulfill their promise, if there is no conflict over the West Philippine Sea, if they fulfill their promise that they would not undertake new reclamation and build new artificial islands.”

He said China should be given the chance to fulfill its promise. “They (Chinese) said they would send us many tourists. They said they would provide us large capital and businesses. Let’s see what will happen to their promises. Our friendship is new and we need time before we can become BFF (best friends forever),” Roque told reporters in Tarlac.

“This does not come as a surprise, the Americans and the Japanese have been our traditional allies,” he said, referring to the survey results.

“It’s only proper that our people have trusted them because of our long and established relationship,” he added. 

“We note, however, that the trust rating of our people towards China is neutral, it is because we have only started our very close relationship with the People’s Republic of China under the administration of President Duterte,” he pointed out. “That’s actually very good already that the Filipinos had a neutral trust rating for China.”

“We Filipinos prefer to have friends rather than enemies. So like all relationships, this is a two-sided relationship. We want to trust China, but China must also prove herself to be trustworthy,” he added.

One of Duterte’s campaign promises in 2016 was to ride on a jet ski to an island in the West Philippine Sea and plant a Philippine flag. Recently, he dismissed the promise as a joke.

‘Joint exploration, but don’t give away deed’

Meanwhile, Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto said the Philippines should jointly explore for oil in the West Philippine Sea with “China and other countries” but should make sure any arrangement is constitutionally compliant and does not endanger or weaken the country’s sovereignty.

He said energy exploration in the West Philippine Sea must be “between private parties and that we won’t be giving away the deed to the area.”

He noted that gas and oil hunts are usually joint ventures between local and foreign groups like the Malampaya gas field off Palawan, which is a collaboration among Philippine, Dutch and British firms.

“If not China, there are really potential foreign partners if not Americans, Europeans, because they have the technology and capital,” the senator said.

He said the government’s invitation for energy exploration must be open to all.

Recto said the search for domestic sources of fossil fuel becomes more urgent with the projected end of Malampaya’s production by 2024.

“If Malampaya, which supplies 45 percent of Luzon’s power, runs out of natural gas in six years, then the search for ways to secure our energy future becomes urgent,” Recto said.

“We have a growing energy appetite to satiate. We are buying close to half a million vehicles a year. In five years, we will be adding eight million to our population, each of whom will consume electricity, from charging cellphones to watching TV,” he said.

The offshore Malampaya gas facilities fuel three base load power plants in Batangas with a capacity of 2,700 megawatts.

The plants provide 40 percent to 50 percent of the energy needs of “the 57 million people living in the world’s fourth most populous island,” Recto said. – Paolo Romero