Being unsafe right in the national capital

THESE past two weeks, I have deliberately missed several business meetings, press forums and traditional pre-Christmas events, including the Philippine Star party last Friday.

As I explain to friends and colleagues, I minimize going out, because I no longer feel safe moving in the forbidding jungle of the national capital. If the event site is beyond the Morato-Timog area of Quezon City, I usually decline the invitation.

Driving up North Luzon Expressway from Quezon City to Clark Field in Pampanga is far more pleasant and less stressful than clawing one’s way to Makati through EDSA’s traffic torture test.

Another reason why I now refrain from driving out to attend evening functions is that when I go home at night there is no more parking slot left in the National Housing Authority compound where I live behind SM City North.

Outsiders have been allowed (for a fee?) to park overnight in areas reserved for us residents. Most of us do not complain about the trespassing and the influx of squatters, for fear of retaliation. The world has gone upside-down: lawless elements have taken over.

The NHA apparently has lost interest in this prime residential area which used to be then First Lady Imelda Marcos’ model NHA human settlement. She loved to show it off to foreign visitors. But despite its first-rate design and location, it has gone to seed.

Last May, I thought that with President Rodrigo Duterte’s promise of no-nonsense law enforcement and the return of peace and order, the scandalous mismanagement of our NHA compound would end. Obviously, I thought wrong.

As I was saying, fear lurks right in the metropolis that a riding-in-tandem assassin might fire at his target or a drug buy-bust police operation might flare into a shootout near where we innocent bystanders happen to be – and become collateral damage.

With human life having gone dirt cheap in the blood-drenched national capital itself, one never knows when a stray bullet might fly in his direction.

Staying home because of the risks to life and limb in the tangled streets is the safer option, but this is also a formula for stagnation despite the (expensive and unreliable) reach of Internet networks.

• Tough-talking Duterte suddenly afraid?

WHY ARE President Duterte and his foreign secretary afraid to file a diplomatic protest over China’s transforming some Philippine isles and reefs into military installations right inside the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone?

What has China given or promised to Duterte that far outweighs national sovereignty and dignity? Why have his usual brave words turned into a whimper just because it was the Chinese militarizing artificial islands built out of Philippine maritime features?

What ever happened to Duterte’s jet ski drama and his proclaiming to the world that he would carry and plant the national flag on a Philippine isle in the Spratlys group off Palawan?

If Duterte and Foreign Secretary Perfecto Yasay are looking for a face-saving excuse, they can change the topic a bit and dwell on that other incident close to Panatag (Scarborough) shoal where China seized an American submersible research glider from the sea.

Since the well-publicized incident occurred about 50 nautical miles northwest of Subic Bay, within the Philippine EEZ, Yasay can protest with both China and the US for unlawfully playing “patintero” in Philippine waters.

At least Manila’s top diplomat could then say that he has filed protests against two superpowers, one of them (US) the haven of his American family. And Duterte, Beijing’s BFF, could then tell China he is playing it fair having also told the US to explain.

We understand that Yasay is a neophyte in diplomacy. Someone should tell him that a protest note, although just a seemingly harmless piece of paper, is important in the country’s case buildup for future reference.

• Hypocritical ‘independent foreign policy’

IF ONLY to put on record the Philippine displeasure, Yasay should summon the Chinese ambassador, advise him to wipe off that Cheshire grin and relay to his government the note protesting China’s island-building and militarization frenzy in Philippine waters.

So as not to devalue the Philippine victory at the international arbitration court in The Hague that invalidated China’s expansive claim over much of the South China Sea, Duterte and Yasay should stop saying that they would put the ruling aside as if it did not matter.

They can actually hide it at the bottom of the moldy folders of other pending bilateral issues with the intention of not allowing it to sour Manila-Beijing relations, but they should not say so publicly as if in an effort to please China.

While at it, the duo should refrain from making a big case out of Duterte’s alleged independent foreign policy – for the simple reason that there is no such thing. Their proclaiming an independent diplomatic stance is pure hypocrisy.

No country of consequence is truly independent of the rest of the world community. Maybe Duterte has in mind following a foreign policy independent of the United States, but he should not distort the sense by saying it is an independent foreign policy.

As Duterte is clearly leaning toward the left to communist China, he is not being independent. That is not being honest. It is hypocrisy.

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