Will Manila protest military planes?

In landing air force transport planes on Panganiban Reef, Beijing lied to the world about not militarizing its artificial islands in the South China Sea. It reneged on promises to Manila of non-provocative acts. The region is watching what the Duterte administration will do.

Two Chinese military aircraft were photographed on the landing strip on Panganiban, internationally known as Mischief Reef. Parked meters apart, the planes apparently arrived together early this year. Panganiban is within the Philippines’ 200-mile exclusive economic zone, and 600 miles from China.

Diplomatic protest is in order, experts say. Asked by reporters, Foreign Sec. Alan Peter Cayetano avoided talking of such action. He said he has yet to verify the photos, published by the Inquirer Wednesday. He supposedly does not know if the photos, dated Jan. 6, 2018, came from the Philippine military.

Critics say the Duterte administration is soft on Chinese incursions in Philippine maritime jurisdictions. The foreign office has been silent on China’s erection of missile pads on the fake islands, and recent installing of signal jammers against sea and aircraft. It claims to hold Beijing to its vow to not concrete any more reefs and shoals into fortresses. Beijing does not need to build more since it already has seven, all within the Philippine EEZ and continental shelf.

Manila has not followed up on its arbitral win against Beijing in July 2016. A UN court has rubbished Beijing’s bogus historical claim to the entire South China Sea. Yet Manila alibis that to press its legal victory would mean unwinnable war. Preferring economic tact, Manila is banking on Beijing’s loans to its “Build, Build, Build” infrastructure plan, mainly for transportation. Yet no transport facility has been built. Recently at the Boao Forum in China’s Hainan province, Philippine officials heralded the first ever big loan – for irrigation. (Boao in recent Philippine history is where a President went, leaving the bedside of a critically ill spouse, to receive what witnesses swore at the Senate as “appearance fee” of $10 million (P500 million) for the $329 million overpriced NBN-ZTE deal.)

Of the militarization of Panganiban Reef and Manila’s arbitral win, former national security adviser Jose Almonte said: “They’ve been constructing for years; they’ve been there since early ‘90s. War does not have to be an option. China, who wants to be a superpower, is sensitive to world opinion. We should continue to uphold the arbitral decision. We can’t enforce it because we have no armed might. Even the UN can’t implement it. And America will not implement it even if they can. So we should campaign for world opinion.”

The military aircraft landing is another step in China’s operations, said Dr. Jay Batongbacal, director of the UP Institute for Maritime Affairs and Law of the Sea. “They started with cargo planes. We should watch out for fighter jets or bombers next. If this happens, it means they are expanding their operations in their bases. Eventually this will be more frequent until it becomes permanent.” Collin Koh, a research fellow at Singapore’s Rajaratnam School of International Studies, was quoted as saying, “Should Manila choose to be silent and downplay the issue, it could become routinized or normalized operations for China...There must be certain calculations within the Chinese political elite circles that Manila is in Beijing’s pocket, because of President Duterte’s desire for rapprochement and quest for Chinese aid and investments, which thus conclude that they could possibly get away with further acts of militarization.”

While running for president, Rodrigo Duterte promised to assert Philippine sovereignty, even picturing himself riding a jet ski by his lonesome to plant the Philippine flag on the Chinese-occupied reefs. Two months ago he said it was just a joke. He followed up with another supposed joke to the Chinese ambassador to make the Philippines a province of China.

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Grab is charging double, triple, even quadruple the usual fares these days, riders rant in the social media. It began after Grab bought out sole competitor Uber. Rep. Jericho Nograles, author of a bill to regulate ride-hailing, says that’s the effect of monopoly. He pooh-poohs Grab’s claim that it has less drivers because many went on Holy Week vacation in end-March till the following long first weekend of April, compounded by more traffic in Mega Manila these days. In fact the higher fares came after the holidays, when Uber suddenly bowed out. Traffic was less since school is out. Still, there was a surge of ride-hailers of Grab, the only choice left. Uber’s drivers had been left in the lurch. Because of the volume of hailers for the same number of Grab cars, Grab’s algorithm automatically upped the fares. Only remedially did Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board member Aileen Lizada make Grab reduce its surge rate. From up to twice the travel-distance charge during peak hours, it may now tack on only 1.5 times.

Uber, meantime, faces a fine of P500,000 to P2,000,000 a day for defying the Philippine Competition Commission. The agency had wanted two weeks to two months to study the buyout. Mergers and acquisitions that foster monopolies are prohibited, and the PCC has power to review those involving more than P2 billion. Nograles likens the Grab takeover to a basketball match in which the other team was bought. Lizada claimed powerlessness to stop Uber from closing shop, as it had only two employees left. She was silent about Uber’s 30,000 so-called partner-drivers.

As for Grab’s unauthorized charge of P2 per minute, it claims to a supposed right unilaterally to raise fares under a 2015 memo of the Dept. of Transport. LTFRB chairman Martin Delgra and board member Ronaldo Corpus were surprised to hear that in a hearing last Tuesday (Lizada was absent). LTFRB had set Grab and Uber’s rates in December 2016 and the P2 per minute was not part of it. Grab had no authority to change it on its own yet introduced the P2 per minute-travel time rate in June 2017, and merely told LTFRB about it the following month. Despite its supposed right, Grab continued to advertise on its website that it does not charge any travel time rate. It edited its website only after Nograles’ exposé. Nograles sees in that the temerity of a mere franchisee to set the industry rules. Congress, which has constitutional power of franchising, merely delegated its job to LTFRB pertaining to land transportation, not to the department. Grab has crossed not only the PCC and LTFRB but also Congress.

Yesterday LTFRB ordered Grab to suspend the unauthorized P2 per minute. Earlier it told Grab to submit by May 29 exactly how many millions of rides per month it had tacked on the P2 per minute since June 2017. Conservatively estimating it at six million rides a month, Nograles is asking LTFRB to compel Grab to refund riders P3.8 billion. On prodding of Sen. Gatchalian the Senate is to investigate the unauthorized charge when it reopens on May 15. The House committee on transport has been mum.

Grab says it’s cruel for Nograles to compel its drivers to refund the P3.8 billion. Yet Nograles has made no such statement. In fact, he has threatened to sue Grab for non-bailable syndicated estafa once it passes on to drivers the burden of refund. It was Grab that devised the P2 per minute, not the drivers, he says.

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