Sometime in March 1999, the Philippine Navy’s decrepit BRP Sierra Madre landing tanker ship supposedly ran aground by accident on the Ayungin Shoal. It was the USS LST-821 that the United States military handed down to the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and renamed as Barko ng Republika ng Pilipinas (BRP) Sierra Madre.
Since then, the Philippine Navy commissioned BRP Sierra Madre among its own fleet even after this World War-2 era ship just sits in the submerged reef Ayungin, located 105 nautical miles from Palawan. This asserts our sovereignty over Ayungin Shoal lying around the disputed overlapping territorial maritime waters, several of which fall within our country’s 200-mile exclusive economic zone called as the West Philippine Sea (WPS).
The Spratly Islands sprawl over roughly 160,000 square miles in the waters off the coasts of the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan, Vietnam and China – all of which claim parts of the islands, islets, shoals, reefs, atolls and rocks around it.
This brings to mind the New York Times (NYT) video news feature of the BRP Sierra Madre in October 2013. Entitled “A Game of Shark and Minnow,” it showed how the eight-man crew of Philippine Marine officers lived their tour of duty inside the ship. The NYT narrated, one of them, Marine Staff Sgt. Joey Loresto, admitted he did not enjoy being stuck on the BRP Sierra Madre but knew it was necessary. “It’s our job to defend our sovereignty,” the NYT quoted him as saying.
Aside from the presence of many Navy and Coast Guard ships of China, not to mention Chinese militia fishing boats, the other claimant countries have very visible military presence, too. Vietnam has the biggest number of occupied areas in Spratlys. But it has always been the Chinese ships that challenge and engage in bully tactics on our sea vessels that come near our rusty, moribund BRP Sierra Madre. Worse, they even harass our Filipino fishermen sailing in our own seawaters.
The latest bullying incident happened last Aug. 5 when Chinese Coast Guard fired water cannon at our Philippine Coast Guard ship and boats on their way to deliver food and other supply for the BRP Sierra Madre crew. The Chinese side insisted Ayungin Shoal is theirs in defending the water cannon attack.
Amid the loud howls of indignation on this latest incident, the name of former president Joseph Ejercito Estrada (PJEE) suddenly cropped up out of the deep blue sea. Now quietly retired from public service and out of politics, the 86-year-old PJEE was being accused of having allegedly made the Philippine commitment with un-named officials of China to tow the BRP Sierra Madre out of Ayungin.
Naturally, his sons Senators Jinggoy Estrada and JV Ejercito denounced the “fake news” coming from a single source. It all started when China, without giving names and specifics, claimed the Philippine government supposedly “reneged” on such official commitment.
Let us not take the words of Sen. Jinggoy, who was then still San Juan City mayor while younger sibling JV was just a Senate Jaycee while their father was holding office at Malacañang Palace. Let’s hear it directly from former senator Orlando “Orly” Mercado, then the Defense secretary of PJEE, who broke his silence on the matter.
“BRP Sierra Madre was deliberately ran aground in 1999. I had PJEE’s approval,” Mercado swore.
As deterrence tactic, Mercado admitted, another ship – BRP Benguet – “deliberately” got stuck at the Panatag (Scarborough) Shoal in Zambales.
Now 77 years old and also retired from politics for so many years already, Mercado attested in all his media interviews that not an inch to move out the BRP Sierra Madre happened during the shortened term of PJEE. However, in the Cabinet Security Cluster debate, Mercado lost the arguments against towing BRP Benguet from Scarborough.
Mercado and the elder Estrada were former colleagues at the Senate during the 8th Congress. Both were among the “Magnificent 12” senators who voted on Sept.16, 1991 to reject the extension of the Philippine-US military bases agreement.
When PJEE assumed office at Malacañang in June 1998, he picked Mercado, who previously chaired the powerful Senate committee on national security and defense. Mercado is currently a faculty member of the Ateneo School of Government and “Eminent Fellow” of the Development Academy of the Philippines, and also teaches at the Command General Staff College of the AFP.
Sadly, we cannot have any corroborating testimony from the late AFP chief of staff Gen. Angelo Reyes. Both Mercado and Reyes had bitter parting of ways with PJEE during the EDSA-2 “power grab” in January 2001. They joined the groups that installed then vice president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (GMA) to succeed the ousted president.
In 2006, GMA named Mercado as her Philippine envoy to China, but Sen. Jinggoy blocked his confirmation at the Commission on Appointments.
Nonetheless, it did not stop Mercado from standing up for truth, knowing in his heart and mind that PJEE is a man who stands brave against bullies. When such claim on Mr. Estrada did not pan out as intended by its purveyor, it was the turn of former president GMA to issue a curt denial over the weekend. Back as Pampanga congresswoman, former president GMA issued a terse statement that she, too, did not give any official commitment to China.
It would not be a surprise if former president Rodrigo Duterte, known for his China-friendly foreign policy shift, would soon also issue a denial, if any. On July 17, Mr. Duterte flew to Beijing and met with President Xi Jinping of China at the State Guesthouse in Beijing. On Aug. 2, Mr. Duterte went to Malacañang and shared with President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. (PBBM) about his talks with President Xi. But there was no official disclosure of matters taken up in their meeting.
Beforehand, however, PBBM appeared in a video message to assure the public that nobody from his administration made such commitment with China. And, should there be any such commitment, PBBM declared, he will “rescind” it right away. So where’s the beef?