A country for sale
Maraming nagugutom sa Pilipinas. Maraming walang lupang sinasaka. Maraming walang trabaho. Maraming naghihirap, isa sa bawat tatlong Pilipino sang ayon sa gobyerno mismo. Ang pangunahing dahilan sa paghihirap ay ang patuloy na pagguho ng industriya at agrikultura sa ilalim ng isang one-sided economic liberalization (lower tariffs, unchecked smuggling, missing safety nets, poor application of safeguard measures, trade-industry policy incoherence, high cost of doing business, etc.). Tanging remittances ng 10 milyong overseas Filipinos (contract workers at immigrants) ang bumubuhay sa bansa.
And yet, the behavior of some policy makers is bizarre. Instead of addressing the land, hunger, food insecurity, joblessness and poverty affecting the majority of Filipinos, they are proferring a strange solution-recklessly and lazily share our seas, our lands, our resources and our skies with the foreign powers. Spratlys deal and JPEPA for our seas, RP-China agri deals for our lands, liberal resource exploitation policy for our minerals and open-skies policy in Clark and Subic for our skies.
All this being justified based on the flimsy excuse that these foreign powers will bring in investments, technology and jobs for our people. This is nothing but a revival of old colonialism, this time initiated by the local ‘commissioners’ and foreign ‘brokers’ and embellished with neo-liberal balderdash on ‘economic openness’. Have we forgotten the long chain of people’s resistance against the encomiendas-haciendas, plantation agriculture and extractive-based development? Is the Philippines for sale?
On our seas, why dilute our claim on the Spratlys, a huge area which is within our continental shelf, by sharing its development (in the name of seismic and mineral mapping) with China, which is 1,000 nautical miles away from this island group? Why bow to the pressures of China to assert our right to define our territorial seas and include these islets in our 200-mile exclusive economic zone as stipulated by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)?
On our seas and our lands, why are some members of the Senate turning blind on the unconstitutionality of the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement (JPEPA), which requires the Philippines to open up land ownership to foreigners and allows the free movement of Japanese ‘factory ships’ in our waters even while Japan is able to retain all their restrictive laws against foreign encroachment on Japanese waters?
Still on lands, why the 19 RP-China agricultural deals (signed January 2007) committing the government to identify and consolidate over 1.2 million hectares of Philippine lands which Chinese investors can develop to grow food, fruit, flower, vegetable and bio-fuel crops for China, with the Chinese investors themselves providing the technology, direct management and marketing facilitation? Because of the opposition registered by various farmers’ organizations and agrarian reform advocates among the bishops, Secretary Art Yap suspended in September 2007 the 1.2 million-hectare deals. But how come some local government units and special government agencies are still trying to identify and consolidate thousands of hectares of land which the Chinese investors can take over?
On mineral and oil resources, what is the pricing policy for the oil and minerals extracted in the Philippines by foreign exploration companies? Why, for instance, is the government royalty on the Malampaya oil only less than 10 per cent?
And now on Philippine skies, why has the Philippines, starting in 2006, unilaterally given foreign air carriers free access to Clark air base even if their home countries have not given similar access to our own Filipino carriers? And now pending in Malacanang is a draft Executive Order widening further this unilateral access by including Subic in this open-skies arrangement and by allowing foreign air carriers unlimited frequency and capacity of flights, including availment of non-cabotage rights. And yet, no similar reciprocal rights are being extended to Philippine air carriers by the home countries of these foreign air carriers. In other words, while the restrictions or limitations under existing Air Services Agreements are waived by Malacanang in favor of foreign air carriers, the same restrictions or limitations will continue to be imposed on Filipino air carriers by foreign states! Thus, air carriers from Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore and Malaysia have been given unlimited and unrestricted access to Clark and will be given additional and permanent privileges under the draft EO, and yet our own carriers such as Cebu Pacific and PAL have been denied reciprocal rights in these countries! Obviously, foreign air carriers are not only placed on equal footing as Philippine carriers but will in fact be placed in a better position than Philippine air carriers.
We, at the Fair Trade Alliance, say NO to all these anti-Filipino and unfair trade and economic policies. We call on the government to:
– Recall the Joint Seismic Monitoring agreement with China and Vietnam on the Spratlys,
– Pass immediately the law delineating our territorial seas under UNCLOS,
– Renegotiate the JPEPA,
– Suspend - permanently - the RP-China deals on the 1.2 million hectares,
– Recognize the gravity of the food crisis and the need for emergency ‘food for the poor’ measures,
– Reversal of policy of agriculture import dependence,
– Early passage of Agrarian Reform renewal with reforms,
– Renegotiate the Malampaya royalty sharing,
– Disclose to the public the details of the various oil and mining projects involving foreign interests,
– Recall Executive Order 500 and Executive Order 500 A and scrap the issuance of the draft Executive Order 500 B, and
– Open our skies based on fair, equal and reciprocal airspace arrangements.
Save our seas, lands, resources and skies against foreign marauders and their local brokers!
Sama-sama nating isulong ang maunlad na Pilipinas sa ilalim ng patas at makatarungang kalakalan!
