MALACAÑANG has confirmed that former President Fidel V. Ramos has accepted President Duterte’s offer for him to head the country’s backchannel talks with China on joint exploration and exploitation of natural resources in disputed territories in the South China Sea.
“FVR has indicated that he has received a clean bill of health, and has accepted the President’s offer to engage China in conversations germane to our common interests,” Presidential Spokesman Ernesto C. Abella said in a statement.
Communications Secretary Martin M. Andanar said an important announcement will be made by Mr. Duterte in his State of the Nation Address (SONA) today regarding foreign policy in the territorial dispute in the South China Sea.
Andanar said President Duterte had convened the National Security Council with National Security Adviser Hermogenes C. Esperon Jr., Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Jesus G. Dureza and Ramos regarding the territorial dispute.
“That meeting was so productive, and that meeting led to a very important addition to the State of the Nation Address for the President that will be delivered tomorrow,” Andanar said in a news conference.
However, Mr. Duterte had already revealed that Ramos wanted the favorable verdict of the United Nations’s Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) to be set aside while the bilateral talks with China are ongoing.
This is contrary to an earlier statement from Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfecto R. Yasay Jr., who rejected China’s earlier offer for the Philippines to set aside the arbitration ruling as a precondition for starting any bilateral talks.
Mr. Duterte said in a speech in Maguindanao on Friday night that Ramos wanted to set aside the arbitration ruling while bilateral talks are ongoing with China, because that would prompt Chinese investments to come in and the Mindanao region will “wallow in progress.”
“I really pray that we are able to settle this China Sea [dispute]. Ramos said that it’s all right if we take out the arbitral judgment from the talks,” Mr. Duterte said.
“If that’s the case, and if it’s really the will of the people, especially Congress, then we will wallow in progress here, because there will, indeed, be many investments that will come in because of the land. Because of the fertility of the soil and the fact that there is no typhoon to destroy the cycle of our crops and the cycle of the weather,” he added.