Filosopo Tasyo is more real than fictional

There are fictional characters known throughout the world for their extraordinary strength, uncommon valor and humility. The list includes Superman, Tarzan, and Tal Fulano. In our country, we have Filosopo Tasyo. Tasyo was molded as a character perceived to be known as possessed with ideas that were accurate with the minds of the townspeople, a term equivalent to our “masa”.

Filosopo Tasyo is, to me, a real person with a warm body. While he isn’t named Tasyo, his philosophical idea on governance each time we share thoughts is admittedly more profoundly accurate than mine. Perhaps because he knows I’m a critic of President Rodrigo Duterte, he sometimes humors me with his own harsh words, assailing some wayward presidential actions.

Tasyo lambasts Duterte’s pronouncements on the Visiting Forces Agreement. He fully agrees with the observation of Vice President Leni Robredo and Senator Ping Lacson that when Duterte asked for some kind of financial compensation from the America to hold a joint US-Philippine military exercise, Duterte was in fact, trying to extort money from an ally. Tasyo said the combat training is a consequence of the Mutual Defense Treaty which was established in 1951 between us and the United States to provide mutual support in case of foreign attack. Mutuality of support and compensation are anathema to each other. Indeed, extortion is the nature of payment Duterte is asking.

Tasyo also posits that Duterte is wrong, even in his oblique position (a close translation of an obiter dictum), that joint military exercise can serve as the magnet for Communist China to attack the Philippines in case war erupts against America. I can only agree with Tasyo that even on this side issue, Duterte’s perception is woefully blurred. The truth, according to Tasyo, is that the military installations that China built on some islets in the West Philippine Sea, are the real magnets that will draw the firepower of American conventional and nuclear weaponry. Because of these Chinese army bases, our country can become the battleground of the world’s superpowers. Had China not built its airbases on these islets, our country cannot become a Sino-US warzone.

Tasyo added that these islets belong to the Philippines and the occupation of these places by China is a violation of our territorial integrity. It’s illegal. Had Duterte invoked the ruling of the International Arbitral Tribunal adjudicating the west Philippines Sea as within our jurisdiction, we wouldn’t have reached this peripheral possibility of becoming a catastrophic military flashpoint. In fact, this Duterte inaction is of impeachable character.

I believed that Duterte was harsh in his accusation that Robredo knows nothing about running a country. Tasyo corrected me immediately. He said that Duterte wasn’t just harsh. He sounded like an arrogant dictator and on that very issue he was utterly wrong. When Duterte asked Robredo to study the constitutional provisions on international relations, he, according to Tasyo, only showed his unpardonable ignorance of the fundamental law. Foreign relations isn’t within the sole jurisdiction of the president. No wonder he cannot judiciously wield this executive function. His ignorance misleads him.

I’m sure there are many other Filosopo Tasyos in our midst. They happen to shut their mouths for fear of being red-tagged.