It was an inutile SONA

By Herbert Vego

PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte did not inspire but despaired us in his State of the Nation Address (SONA) the other day when he said, “Talagang inutil ako dyan, walang magawa.”

He was justifying his refusal to stand by the Philippines’ exclusive sovereign rights to the 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone in the West Philippine Sea.

“Unless we are prepared to go to war,” he elaborated, “I would suggest that we better just call off and treat this as a diplomatic endeavor. China is claiming it, we are claiming it. China has the arms, we do not have them. So, it’s simple as that. They are in possession of the property.”

Coincidentally, inutil in Filipino and inutile in English differ only in spelling. They simply mean either “useless” or “pointless”.

Duterte’s defeatist attitude reminds us of what he had said many times before, as in the February 20, 2020  oath-taking of the officials of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts officials in Malacañang: “Kasi ‘pag hindi natin kaya… we can be a territory of the Americans or we can be a province of China.”

He could have cited the July 12, 2016 decision of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, affirming that the Philippines has exclusive sovereign rights over the West Philippine Sea.

Ironically since then, however, Duterte has cultivated personal and official ties with Chinese President Xi Jinping in the hope of bagging huge loans and grants for our country’s infrastructure development. He stressed moving away from the United States.

In February this year, Duterte prevailed upon Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin to serve to the United States government the notice to abrogate the Philippine-U.S. Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) effective August 2020.

The latest word we heard from Locsin, however, is that Duterte  had suspended his decision to scrap the two-decade-old troop deployment agreement with the United States.

Would it change the attitude of Xi toward Digong?

Apparently the latter would not want that. One of the most memorable words in his SONA was his supplication to Xi for prioritized access to coronavirus vaccine whenever China develops one.

He did not anymore mention about any financial offer to any Filipino scientist who could invent anti-COVID medicine.

There had been locally-invented drugs presented to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for approval but to no avail.

Duterte also did not make sense in sniping at Ilonggo Senator Franklin Drilon for allegedly defending the Lopez “oligarchy” and alluding to his children Paulo and Sarah Duterte instead as “oligarchs,” too. Sarah is the mayor of Davao City; Paulo, congressman.

Drilon denied the accusation, explaining that he was merely fighting for press freedom in the wake of the non-renewal of the franchise of the Lopez-owned ABS-CBN radio-TV network; and for the welfare of 11,000 workers who would lose their jobs as a result of such closure.

Drilon, who claims to be related to no other incumbent politician, had asked the President to prevail upon Congress to pass a bill banning political dynasty as mandated by the Article II, Section 26 of the Constitution: “The State shall guarantee equal access to opportunities for public service, and prohibit political dynasties as may be defined by law.”

-oOo-

It’s not often that security guards serving two conflicting employers show fondness and compassion for each other. This is the lesson we learned from the anecdote that Atty. Hector Teodosio was telling us.

Panay Electric Co. (PECO) still owns its business office and staff house on Gen. Luna St. But the adjoining power station now belongs to MORE Power as decided by the judge in the extradition case that transferred the power distribution franchise in Iloilo City from PECO to MORE.

In the beginning, the guards of both camps hardly talked to each other while seriously guarding their territories. However, the better-paid MORE guards eventually won the friendship of the PECO guards by sharing them food for lunch.

This harmonious scenery did not escape the attention of PECO managers, who had instructed them to refrain from sharing food and water with the other camp.

The instruction probably fell on deaf ears. This led to the dismissal and replacement of PECO guards.

The next day, the PECO managers noticed that the terminated guards were guarding the other side of the land, wearing MORE Power uniforms.

Totoo pala, kung sino ang inaapi ay siyang nagwawagi.