RETIRED Philippine Ambassador Alberto A. Encomienda believes the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) must focus on its task of implementing the country’s foreign policy and regaining its stature as one of the government’s leading agencies.
Encomienda, who has served as the Philippine top diplomat in Greece, Malaysia and Singapore, said he is disappointed at the apparent loss of professionalism in the DFA.
He observed that DFA personnel today are more concerned with promotions and assignments, along with the public perception that it has become nothing more than a passport factory.
Encomienda said he misses the golden years of the DFA, when it was headed by the likes of Carlos P. Romulo, Narciso Ramos and Emmanuel Pelaez.
“I am not saying I am a model, but during our time, patriotism was strong, because then, one would be ashamed to be seen as pining for a juicy assignment. Today some of them had the shame to choose where they want to be assigned,” Encomienda said.
He said the DFA should basically function as a think tank and not, as the majority of Filipinos think today, as an office for providing passports.
The Asean Summit
Encomienda also believes that one of the tasks the DFA should be prioritizing right now is the Philippine hosting of the Asean Summit next year.
“The country should have been preparing for it shortly after Laos hosted the event in July, instead of focusing too much on the drug problem. The preparatory work for the hosting should have begun the day Laos ended its turn, but I do not see any development,” Encomienda said.
He added, “In preparing for the Asean, we have to highlight our maritime concerns, fisheries, integrated coastal joint management, marine environment, and this will bring us to the situation of the South China Sea.”
Encomienda said the summit can be an opportunity to highlight the very character of Asean as a maritime region. He said there are many opportunities for the Philippines in hosting the summit.
From the Laos hosting of the summit, Encomienda thinks President Duterte should let Foreign Secretary Perfecto R. Yasay Jr. do most of the talking and limit himself to speaking during matters of high national interests.
He also suggested that before any important occasion, Mr. Duterte should be thoroughly briefed on foreign policy, simply because that is not his forte.
“He should leave a lot of the talking to his foreign secretary and other spokesman, because, if things go wrong, there would be wiggle room to get out of it. Maybe your word or my word does not count in the international community but if you are a head of state, everything you say has to be measured and carefully studied for their implications,” Encomienda said.
Still, Encomienda said he voted for Mr. Duterte during the last presidential election, and praised him for addressing the country’s drugs and criminality issues the right way.
The way he sees it
According to Encomienda, the DFA is now on the right path, after it corrected how it does its daily business. He remembers a time when it resembled a mall, and where food vendors are roaming its halls.
However, he is a bit skeptical on Yasay being the country’s foreign secretary, because he is not a diplomat, but instead came from the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“We have a President who is doing very well on domestic issues and his popularity remains high because of the way he is addressing the domestic issues. But he is quite weak on foreign policy,” he said.
Encomienda said that, instead of making matters easier for President Duterte, Yasay has become more of an apologist.
He believes the President should never appoint anyone to any government position just solely based on friendship.
Encomienda also said he would reject it immediately if Mr. Duterte appoints him as the country’s foreign secretary.
“I would prefer to be in the background. That is how a diplomat should behave, like Chou En-lai, that is the role I would like to play,” he said.
Zhou Enlai, or Chou En-lai, was the first premier of the People’s Republic of China, and served under Mao Zedong. He was instrumental in the Communist Party’s rise to power, and later in consolidating its control, forming of a foreign policy and developing the Chinese economy.
To Encomienda, he sees Sen. Alan Peter S. Cayetano, Mr. Duterte’s running mate during the last presidential election, and former Sen. Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. as having the right qualities to become the country’s foreign secretary.
Encomienda, a soft-spoken diplomat retired in 2008, after spending 10 years on the country’s maritime concerns as an archipelagic state. He headed the then-Maritime and Ocean Affairs Center until 2008.
Encomienda authored the 240-page book The South China Sea Issues and Related Core Interests of the Philippines. It came out shortly after the Arbitral Tribunal at the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague favorably ruled in favor of the Philippines, and said China’s occupation of the area, defined by their nine-dash line, is illegal.
He said the book was not meant to be a definitive study of the South China Sea issues but merely as a guide.
The mutual defense treaty
Encomienda said the main issue in the present military scenario for the Philippines is that it tries to infuse credibility to a military option by invoking the Philippines-United States Mutual Defense Treaty, where there is not even a mutual understanding between the two parties.
“When queried by the local news media, US Ambassador Philip Goldberg refused to clarify on Obama’s statements, casting doubts on the true intention of our superpower treaty ally,” Encomienda said.
“The US declared that the Philippines-United States Mutual Defense Treaty does not apply inasmuch as the Spratlys archipelago is not part of the metropolitan territory of the Philippines,” he said, while adding that Article 4 of the mutual defense treaty defines the subject of the treaty as being an armed attack in the Pacific area on either of the partners.
“I have made the assertions, since last year, that the mutual defense treaty is passé,” Encomienda said.
Image credits: Jimbo Albano
4 comments
You sound like a nut case!
You forgot to add “shut-up”.
That’s about as much intelligence as you can muster.
It appears to be pointless in briefing Duterte on foreign policy. He simply won’t listen to anyone.
Don’t confuse Duterte with the facts…his mind is already made up.
The foreign affairs ministry ought to rise above the noteriety of being known merely as a passport factory with very long lines and waiting periods and begin performing the fundamental role of assessing, formulating, and promoting Philippine international policy and external relations within the global sphere. The secretary should stop playing presidential apologist and start asserting some much-needed leadership before our nation transforms into just another lackey of the other world superpower.