10 October 2016•Update: 11 October 2016
By Hader Glang
ZAMBOANGA CITY, the Philippines
Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte announced Monday that he would set aside a dispute with Beijing over a shoal in the South China Sea “for now” but would request that Filipino fishermen be allowed to access the resource-rich area.
“I will go to China. We are okay with them. Let’s not dwell on the Scarborough [Shoal] issue for now. We can’t solve it even if we get angry,” he said during a visit to the southern majority Muslim island province of Basilan.
The remarks came ahead of his upcoming visit to China scheduled for Oct. 18-21.
Beijing claims around 90 percent of the South China Sea -- which Manila calls the West Philippine Sea -- despite other Asian counties considering some of its waters, islands and reefs as their territory.
In July, an arbitration court in The Hague ruled in favor of the Philippines in its petition against China's "nine-dash line" claim on a large part of the sea and said fishermen from the Philippines had traditional fishing rights in the Scarborough Shoal, but China had interfered with these rights by restricting access. Beijing declared the court's award "null and void".
Since winning the May 9 election, Duterte has expressed willingness to open the Philippines to alliances with China while pursuing an “independent foreign policy” in terms of relations with the Philippines’ long-time ally the United States.
During his speech at a forum on agrarian reform in Basilan’s Lamitan City on Monday, Duterte said, “we will ask them [China] to allow our fishermen brothers to return [to the shoal].”
He expressed optimism about his upcoming talks with Beijing officials, indicating that the Philippines has already begun exporting bananas and pineapples to China.
“I suspect that they really want to help us,” he said.
Duterte traveled to Basilan to receive first-hand information about a “cocolisap infestation” of scale insects affecting coconut trees -- which account for the main industry in Basilan. The provincial government has responded to the infestationi by declaring a state of calamity.
Duterte and his agriculture secretary, Emmanuel Pinol, announced agricultural support to affected farmers, presiding over the distribution of seven four-wheel drive farm tractors, hundreds of packs of seeds of various crops, fertilizers and 70 motorized fiberglass fishing boats.
