THERE’S positive news coming from Xinhua, the state news agency of China.
It said that the visit of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte is seen as the start of restoration of trust between the two sides that have recently been pushed to an aggressive stance just a few months before over the South China Sea-West Philippine Sea (SCS-WPS) dispute.
Xinhua said Duterte's visit shows the "bad blood between Beijing and Manila has finally begun to give place to good faith," the AP news about this visit said.
It has been just over a hundred days and yet we seem to have been dragged through the worst that people can ever drag us to. There is an apparently manipulation to put the President in the wrong, all the time.
But the Dabawenyos, majority of us, remained stalwart in our belief in the President’s vision. We admit we have been rolling our eyes in dismay when he is once again taken to task over his pronouncements, but we see his and his Cabinet Secretaries’ actions, and we know we have a government that is working overtime for the greater good.
The unbelievers will never believe, let them be in their tiny visions.
The President has been firm even as a candidate, he will not shed the blood of Filipinos, it is a war that the country cannot win.
While in the last administration, our hopes were being fanned by rumors that the US government will be helping us put up a fight, no less that their envoys were consistently saying they will not have a direct had on putting a stop on the Chinese in their occupation of various shoals there.
In short, there was never any clear-cut commitment.
We will be fighting alone that’s what the message is being said, worse, the battle will be fought on Philippine soil, shedding Filipino blood, destroying Philippine properties.
The leader that he is, President Duterte opts for cooperation, despite jeers by the unbelievers that he seems to be selling out.
He works on, unperturbed, with a clear vision on where he wants the Filipinos to be: safe and secure in their homes and in their places of work.
Thus, while those sabre-rattling for war are still focused on the SCS-WPS dispute, the President has placed illegal overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in China among his agenda.
Soon after taking over as President, he also ordered the immediate help for OFWs who have been left jobless in Saudi Arabia because of the oil price slump.
Yes, the detractors may feast on how inappropriate Duterte’s curses are for a President, but all that we can say is that, at least there is someone who is doing the cursing for us.
If only for that, then we are saved from losing our temper ourselves, considering that Filipinos have long wished that someone shake their hands and commit to help them even if only to do the cursing against all that aggravates us.
For that, the lowly Filipinos who rarely had anyone seriously taking up the cudgels for them (except when election time is near), will forever be grateful. How pathetic indeed have we allowed our people to become.