Implications of the COVID-19 Crisis on Philippine Multilaterialism

Speech before the international webinar on Implications of the COVID-19 Crisis on Philippine Multilateralism hosted by the Philippine Council for Foreign Relations on its 35^th year anniversary.

Good afternoon/ ladies and gentlemen. Shout out first to the Philippine Council for Foreign Relations for hosting its first international webinar. 

To the distinguished speaker Mr Miguel Bautista and esteemed reactors Ambassador Vidal Querol and Mr Johnny Chotrani, I deem that you have already shed with us your wisdom and experiences when it comes to Philippine multilateralism.

And for me, as the last speaker  in the pool of experts, what more can I add to this continuing narratives on multilateralism?

So, I’d rather try to synthesize the discussion and spell out own analysis from the thesis  and anti-thesis of multilateralism in the post-covid crisis narratives.

There’s this quote from Dutch Philosopher Baruch Spinoza that says, “States should practice multilateralism and abandon unilateral actions that adversely affect a democratic and equitable international order, refraining from the threat or use of force

However, we're essentially in the beginning of another Cold War between China and the United States. And the Philippines, now dwarfed between the two competing powers, is nonetheless indisposed of the grave consequences of its choice.

As Spinoza calls it again, “nature abhors a vacuum”. 

Yes indeed, there’s a leadership vacuum posited by the coronavirus pandemic, and the consequences of the breakdown of the US-China relations at the moment which can be construed as a grave competition of unpopularity/ for the world while the global economy tries to recover and work together to achieve the keystone / of the whole arch/ of globalization and global trade.

With that pulled out, there's going to be a tremendous amount of disturbance and disruption with the rise of populist leaders that signals the fall of liberalism and considers the brink of multilateralism.

And this Cold War analogy is "not perfect, but there are elements, including/ the hardening of system-type competition, racketing up of military competition, and pressure to delink economically, that were not as evident a few years ago," described by the Philippine counterpart in the US, the Council on Foreign Relations. 

The ideological struggle  between the Communist and Capitalist systems as espoused by Moscow and Washington can be translated nowadays to the standoff between Washington and Beijing which can now be compared to the foothills of the new Cold War as articulated by former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

So far, we heard in-depth insider’s notes and experiential comparative analysis of the European Union and ASEAN, of India and ASEAN, and of China and the US from our main speaker and two distinguished reactors before me. 

But synthesizing everything and weaving it from using theoretical frameworks on International Political Economy, there’s this nomenclature called, Economic Nationalism or sometimes referred to as Neo-Mercantilism.

The global economic recession and depression have contracted nations-states to finally own its economic and financial protectionism caused by the havoc interests of health insecurity caused by the COVID-19. It is still unresolved as the world transitions to the new normal, but it remains indefinite to resolving the economic impact of the killer virus.

Now, economic nationalism developed theoretically, to criticize economic liberalism model with the following tenets.

First, that states compete economically. A good examples would be the entry of trade war  between the US and China which we will see more of 2.0 and 3.0 of this economic slash technological warfare in the near future. / It debunks the thesis of liberalism  where it believes that companies compete economically, but never the states. But we saw in the covid pandemic that only states failed, so do big companies.

Secondly, free trade only benefits the wealthiest, most advanced nations. But during the COVID -19 pandemic, the contagion became an equalizer. It crippled many sophisticated public health systems and bug down economies of first-world and developed countries from Europe to the United States, Japan and South Korea / including emerging economies of Brazil and Nigeria.

The assumption embodies that only the advanced or “mature” industries / will defeat less advanced or “infant” industries. But the pandemic has reversed the tide. We saw how start-ups and other innovative companies / survived the pandemic, seeing respected companies fell at the mercy of the COVID-19.

Thirdly for the less advanced nations there needs to be alternative way of getting rich. Free trade won’t lead to riches. It wasn’t true again / as we saw how the pandemic levelled off the playing field. We saw how illiberal economies like Vietnam, China, Cuba and Russia were unscathed by the economic impacts of the COVID-19 and even became crusaders for helping bigger and developed nations combat the unforgiving virus.

Talking about the Political Economy of Pandemics, the COVID-19 policy responses have had attempted to represent the unprecedented challenge Policy- makers worldwide, have to react fast to a totally new type of crisis under enhanced public scrutiny, as these policies are immediately compared across countries.

Then what are the lessons gained and learned: 

·         History shows COVID-19’s economic fallout may be with us for decades. 

·         In large-scale pandemics, effects will be felt by the global economy, or across wider regions for two reasons/ (1) the infection itself is widespread which we saw in the COVD 19, and (2) because trade and market integration / eventually it propagates the economic shock across the map. 

What are the Staggering Findings: 

·       The effects are staggering when we speak of large scale economy  affecting pandemics based from the experience in past pandemics. Economic depression / can take from 5 to 10 years.

·      This neoclassical mechanism considers the labour-to-capital ratio of declines of the Loss of labour without parallel destruction of capital leading to a rebalancing of the relative returns to labour and capital.

·      In the past wars occur before pandemics, but now we see the reverse where a pandemic affects conflicts by major powers. 

So what will be the next Liberal Order

·     The liberal world order is collapsing because its leading patrons,starting with the United States with 75 years of American leadership/ is now being questioned.

      

     Washington is settling in for a protracted struggle for dominance with China, Russia, and other rival powers.

·      The United States may no longer be the world’s sole superpower, but its influence has never been premised on power alone. It also depends / on an ability to offer others a set of ideas  and institutional frameworks / for mutual gain.

·       A return to great-power competition would destroy what is left of the global institutions that governments rely on for tackling common problems. Liberal democracies would further descend into disunion and thereby lose their ability to shape global rules and norms.

Then how do we counter this scenario by fostering multilateralism? 

The political economy of global multilateralism can be justified. Its criteria for justification are three. 

First, multilateral agreements ideally should offer mutual gains for all the nations that are parties to them. If the gains are not contingent on being part of the multilateral agreement, principles of subsidiarity militate against joining.

Second, ideally multilateral treaties should help nations be governed as an encompassing interest their diffuse citizenry rather than special interests. One important way of achieving this goal is to increase jurisdictional competition among nations which is the defining virtue of sovereignty.

Finally, multilateral agreements should not require a complex and intrusive international enforcement apparatus, because distant international bureaucracies are likely to be captured by special interests and thus reduce the power of encompassing interests in national governance.

All in all, what will happen to the Philippines?

As the world offers a view on the multiplexity of coalition, Europe sees a repolarization of alliances, Latin America / cries for non-polarity of union/  in its region, Asia adheres to a staggering kind of multilateralism, Africa speaks of its continent's protectionaism of resources, while North America vies for the splintering of regional order.  With all the fluidity of frameworks of the community of nations in post-pandemic, in the end what I wanted to see more / is on how our country will cope up from changes of the multilateral world.

The incentives underpinning a country's decision/ to enter a regional trade agreement  is when a multilateral free trade agreement is available, and of how entering a regional trade agreement affects the incentives to pursue multilateral trade liberalization.

But with the heavy burden on COVID-19 pandemic the Philippines must enter into regional trade and security agreementsthat will not undermine / the incentives towards multilateral liberalization.

But in moments of global recession and depression, et’s be open to a solid  framework of sound political economy that justifies these divergent intuitions and shows that the Philippines is rooted in more than just a reflexive liking for trade combined with a disdain for the environment, human rights, criminal justice, and world peace.

It must champion global multilateralism for practical politics where compromise is frequently necessary to present a sketch of what we would call "a regulatory ideal" - a model by which we should inform the concrete practices of global multilateralism.

Thank you very much and looking forward during the open forum.

Think Tech Tank: Touring the World in the Time of Pandemic

If I were to ask, what did I do during the quarantine period and at the peak of the viral and racial pandemic? I must say that I virtually toured the world with a big purpose. While some of us optimized the perks and privilege of staying at home, perhaps turning our own bubbles into productivity.

As I traveled round the world through the net, bearing the fume of our snail-pace internet speed and ramshackle internet service, my forbearance brought me to video conferencing beautiful minds in six continents and opening up with dialogues in 13 countries (Australia, Chile, Czech Republic, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Thailand, and the United States).

But still, Antartica remains in my bucket list, reserved in the same intellectual wanderlust for the next season of my podcasting on the effects of climate change.

The fulfillment of meeting my colleagues, old and new friends through Zoom, from abroad and locally, endeared the longing to share our talents and help the world in our own little ways.

Yes, I  successfully interviewed in my audio visual conversation 20 global experts, celebrated policy-makers, and top innovators who willingly shared their research, analyses, fears and forecasts amid our fight against the coronavirus disease, racial discrimination, and other important international development and security issues.  

While our medical frontline heroes wrestled with an unfair war, watching from television how people from different walks of life had fallen prey from a monstrous virus and why our world suddenly succumbed into economic recession and depression.

In my insatiable aspiration to contribute to the narratives beyond the world health crisis and chronicle foreign perspectives in our plight to squash the COVID-19, just like an armchair anthropologist poised for virtual ethnographic study, I assembled my small team from the International Development and Security Cooperation (IDSC), a non-profit organization, aimed at advancing development towards a secure world, as they fly with me in this once in a lifetime cognitive adventure in time of a global lockdown.

Capacitating on the knowledge-economy posited by contraction of globalization while embracing the new normal of information dissemination, knowledge production, and remote podcasting. I told my team to beat the handicap of blended learning as we prepare for an online global tour despite tight resources.

Amid the pandemic, we pursued an alternative, balance, independent platform and fair web content offering authentic home-based production in sharing intelligent conversations from premiere academics, analysts, and scientists from around the world. The beginning of a remote think tanking from a global perspective by not only reporting world events and sharing information but offering a plethora of in-depth analyses from expert-to-expert dialogues.  

In spite of serious recorded conversations with full consent from our special guests, a step forward to ethical standards, there were also bloopers and hilarious behind the scenes seen during the productions from technical glitches, internet disaster, sound system deficiency, wardrobe mismatch and to midnight podcasting due to time zone differences. 

We made sure that the content of every podcast conversation from six continents became the heart of our incredible and creative team. It inspired us to tell eclectic stories on international development and security that are not digested much in the media and other reading materials. 

I must commend my good colleague Al Feliciano, a net wizard and ‘E-numan’ buddy after every successful podcast production of the IDSC. 

I would care now how much journalists, researchers, producers and directors would feel every after sad and happy interview. I sobbed and couldn’t sleep after learning from the convo that seventy percent of Peru’s population got infected in public markets by economic reason that majority of them don’t own refrigerator. But by understanding the national culture of cooking daily the food fresh I made some reservations from my biases. 

I couldn't imagine how billion of Indians were barred from going out during the national lockdown as a preventive strategy to survive the pandemic. Happiness shrouded me after Italians waged an all-out war against the coronavirus and successfully flattened the medical curve and sent their message of hope of “andra tutto bene” to the world.

We shared the same disenchantment when Chileans suffered the same plot of cybersecurity crackdown during the COVID-19 or how MENA and South Asia regions wanted to reset its economy after the pandemic. 

Filipino sinologists analysed intently China’s [mis]behaviours on the US-China trade war, Taiwan’s successful mask diplomacy and Hong Kong protests. On the other side of the story, Filipino-American sociologist and criminal justice advocates brought out their inner voices against systemic racism and racial bias in the United States.

In other podcast episodes, our expert commended Vietnam’s proactive measures on contact tracing and sound policies in confronting China in the South China Sea. Another analyst talked about the Philippines’ aspiration for a military self-reliance while preemptive POST-VFA gave us a flat footed yet tough US-PH relations from an American strategist's views. 

It also drew comparative counterterrorism policymaking with an Indonesian terrorism thinker. We understood how Africans seriously dealt with emerging diseases and pandemic in their continent. We also valued how Czech Republic in Central Europe and Thailand in Southeast Asia set the bar on the new normal practices on tourism, business, and innovation.  

As the interviews got multiplied after producing 15 episodes, expanding my virtual travel from different continents, it spread out my horizon in viewing the world in multi-layered but divergent perspectives of our world system. The sizable soundbites can be translated into future online books, webinars, op-eds or news clips, incubation of prospective development projects, and to a certain point, collaborative works suitable for various platforms in online knowledge production.

Australia offered a view on the multiplexity of coalition, Europe saw a repolarization of alliances, Latin America cried for non-polarity of union in its region, Asia adhered to a staggering kind of multilateralism, while North America vied for the splintering of regional order. With all the fluidity of frameworks of the community of nations in post-pandemic, in the end what I wanted to see more is on how our country will cope up from changes of the Anthropogenic world. 

In time of uncertainties, we need to find solace in our will to survive the pandemic until we finally search the vaccine to heal the world altogether .

Finally, thank you to all your support to the IDSC. Looking forward to more talks with colleagues and friends from around the world. Hoping to see you all in SEASON 2 for engaging and enlightening academic conversations!

Vaccine Heist (Part 2): The Quest for Coronavirus Vaccine Begins

Photo from The Guardian

By Chester B Cabalza

Blogger's Notes:
Commentary of an Academic 
(Copyright @ 2020 by Chester B Cabalza. All Rights Reserved).

Caveat! Just like in Part 1, the fiction comes from the figment of my imagination. The story takes off after the professor gathers his gang as they unlock mysteries behind the making of vaccines. Calling the shots of Resistance, the brilliant Sergio Marquina sends them off to major global cities to find the cure and halt the coronavirus pandemic as the WHO launched the coordinated “Solidarity Trial” in 10 countries around five continents.

Part 2

(Outdoor) Across the vastness of the South China Sea, Tokyo and Lisbon scuba dive like mermaids in full battle gear. They survive the marine extremes beneath the ocean. Crossing the threshold of Liaoning’s hull, China’s largest combat aircraft battleship and symbol of naval dominance in the world’s busiest sea lane.

From the weather deck bossing the ship’s forecastle, birds hurl quickly in remote air; gracefully it flap wings to the horizon. The king sun makes way for its dramatic exit in a grotesque sunset shimmer as the warship wallops the salty body of water and keeps buoyancy in the deep blue sea.

Tokyo carefully throws the antiretroviral drug to Lisbon (a survivor of the COVID disease herself in Madrid). 

Tokyo: Inject it in your body! (She whispers to her. Lisbon keeps mum and paranoid).

They run and hide near the aircraft carriers. Sailors from the People’s Liberation Army Navy deploy a drone and force feed radio frequency identification around the missiles.  

A Chengdu J-20 Chinese fighter jet deplanes. Gandia arrives in full personal protective equipment (PPE) in red jumpsuit wearing a realistic Salvador Dali mask, accompanied by three biogenetically cyborg assassins, chemically brainwashed, and genetically immune by a tailored virus. Cyborg assassins can’t be infected by the coronavirus.

Professor: Don’t you shoot Gandia! He’s on our side! (Talking to the combative ladies using satellite phone patch from his distant hollow).

Lisbon: Sergio, how can we trust him? (Worried of treachery).

Professor: Just trust me! (he sighs in deep breath). Bogota and Denver injected convalescent plasma to Gandia after you recovered from COVID. Your blood contains antibodies to fight the virus. Antibodies are found in the plasma.

Tokyo: Very well! How sure are you that your woman Lisbon is safe here? Are we safe here? I’m used to bank robberies and battles, eh! But not like this one. The virus is unseen, professor! (her temperament explodes like the intensity and stealth of a cat fighter).

You told us what happened in the USS Roosevelt; almost all of the American sailors were asymptomatically infected by the virus! It’s contagious! What shall we do now? Did they find a vaccine yet in Washington?

Lisbon: Gandia can get exposed again to the virus, even if we both recovered from COVID (voice cracking).

Professor: Listen (he tries to calm the two). China solely manufactures Carrimycin tablets, a possible cure for COVID-19-2020.

But Gandia will take the clinical trials for favipivar. Billions of doses are now mass-produced in Wuhan and Shenzhen, after the drug had undergone clinical trials.

Come to think of it ladies, there are 58 candidate drugs for antibodies, 22 for antivirals, 14 for cell-based compound, five for RNA-based compounds, 15 for scanning compounds to be repurposed, and various other therapy categories for anti-inflammatory, antimalarial, interferon, protein-based, antibiotics, and receptor-modulating compounds. 

How can you not take the chances if there are other 66 candidate drugs? Imagine all the 249 compounds our scientists and military physicians are doing today. The world is developing 115 vaccine candidates; let’s not lose this momentum, ladies.

Don’t leave Gandia inside the Liaoning! That’s the safest passage to reach Shanghai and Beijing because of the lockdown! Medicines are needed to be shipped across the world. Make sure that the warship carrier is safe and gets the right of passage once you reach the Horn of Africa and Panama Canal.

Tokyo: Where are the other members of the team?

Professor: I sent them to biotechnology firms and universities. Manila and Denver are in India. Helsinki and Palermo went to Germany. Rio just reached Italy while Stockholm has seen the mass grave in Brazil. Arturo talked to the CIA in New York while Marcella is talking to Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand.  

Tokyo: Make sure we’re all safe, professor! I hope no one from the team will die this time! (Staring at Lisbon, agitated and sharp).

Professor: (Listening in silence. Deep thinking. Mind wanders. Afraid...so afraid)

***

(Indoor) The gang seriously listens to the professor as he vividly lectures on smallpox vaccine discovered by British physician Dr. Edward Jenner.

In the flashback, all of the dead characters are alive sharing their thoughts with robber colleagues (Oslo, Berlin, Moscow, and Nairobi are seated while observing physical distancing inside the chamber).

Berlin walks beside the professor and starts discussing about immunization.

Berlin: (always candid and charismatic especially when he sneers to the team). Dr. Jenner’s work is considered as the foundation of immunology (showing his old photo from the screen). His vaccine killed the smallpox, the only infectious disease to have naturally been eradicated in human history.

Professor: But evil nations will always use infectious diseases for its advantage as a bioterror weapon, remember that!

Rio: Professor, how was smallpox treated at that time?

Professor: Quarantine, vaccination, and people burned all infected clothes and bedding. Those interventions helped the world flatten the epidemic curve. It was thought as an airborne contagious disease that governments panicked in controlling the spread of smallpox. Separate wards in hospitals were built solely for the terminal virus, killing an estimated 300 million people.

Stockholm: Oh, that’s a lot! I pray that COVID pandemic will not kill that much, professor.

Nairobi: Ladies, did you know that the term vaccine (vaccinum) was derived from the Latin word for cow (vacca)? That’s how it reflects the origins of smallpox vaccination. Is it right professor? (amused pleasantly as the crowd gives her a round of applause with her trivial opinion).

Professor: You’re right, senora Nairobi! (he returns the sugary smile at her).

But that’s a misnomer for sure. It’s because the vaccine used to prevent smallpox was likely a horsepox, not cowpox.

Dr. Edward Jenner observed that milkmaids who had gotten cowpox did not show any symptoms of smallpox after variolation or inoculation.

Actually, he infected a young boy with cowpox, but later when he injected the child with the deadly smallpox virus, he did not get sick. It was an accidental mistake that cured the boy. That beautiful mistake cured everybody with smallpox around the world!

Nairobi: Our son would be a genius, professor! If only… (she recalls her offer to him of an artificial insemination while Inspector Raquel smiles at them and sobs in sorrow of Nairobi’s loss).

Manila: Eh professor, how much time did they discover the vaccine for smallpox?

Palermo: The history of smallpox extends into pre-history. The disease likely emerged in human populations about 10,000 BC. The earliest credible evidence of smallpox is found in the Egyptian mummies of people who died some 3000 years ago (looking at Helsinki, trying to impress him).

Professor: That’s right, Palermo…and (trying to expound the facts when Berlin rebuts).

Berlin: Yes, smallpox has existed for at least 3,000 years and was one of the world's most feared diseases until it was eradicated by a collaborative global vaccination programme. The last known natural case was in Somalia in 1977.

Moscow: But China and India practiced smallpox inoculation even before the discovery of vaccination?

Professor: Very well, Moscow.  That’s a method for the prevention of smallpox by deliberate introduction of material from smallpox pustules into the skin. This generally produced a less severe infection than naturally-acquired smallpox, but still induced immunity to it.

Just like in COVID now, countries use various kinds of method. States that experienced relative diseases on SARS, MIERS-COV, and Ebola virus are better off in their medical practice and herd immunity compared with nations that have less exposure on the coronavirus. It’s a novel disease. Still, we’re figuring it out whether or not it’s a natural virus…

Manila: Professor, you didn’t answer me. How much time before Dr. Jenner discovered the vaccine?

In the Philippines, the government is giving away 50 million pesos as a bounty to the discoverer of the vaccine - they got virgin coconut oil and other alternative medicine. Other countries are doing the same thing, giving away prizes to bright ideas. We don’t need to rob banks anymore if we happen to discover the vaccine.

Professor: There’s no vaccine yet for COVID, Manila! (his voice sounds in anguish).  

Dr. Jenner’s method underwent medical and technological changes over the next 200 years, and eventually resulted in the eradication of smallpox.

Everyone’s racing for the vaccine. This isn’t about the Nobel Peace Prize for science and medicine. Scientists and physicians need different stages of clinical trial to do that. The experiment has to undergo phases of test from small, to medium to large clinical testing. Once approved then the drug gets certified to be used by everyone. It should be feasible and mass produced to kill enough the coronavirus. 

It took the world two centuries before the smallpox disease was naturally eradicated through a vaccine!

If our generation won’t survive the plague, perhaps the next generation will outlive it. We see herd immunity with rising recoveries. That’s good! Scientific data would show us that with strict quarantine and lockdown, we flatten and squash the virus, though the contagion keeps on mutating.  

Just like in a flu that can be healed but can’t be cured! Recurring as we see it. There's no cure for the flu, but there are available natural ways to ease the symptoms. It can’t because there are drugs that inhibit one of the enzymes that the virus uses to get into and out of cells.

Right now, there are potential post-infection therapies for COVID-19-20. These are favipiravir, lopinavir, hydroxychoroquine or chloroquine. All are in final stage of human testing before it reaches the fourth phase of manufacturing! Although there are also individual or combined drugs such as lopinavir-ritonavir combined, lopinavir-ritonavir combined with interferon-beta, remdesivir, and hydroxychloroquine done in separate trials.

We’re running out of time ladies and gents! This quest for vaccine can become our exit strategy. Making sure that the vaccine is safe by undergoing rigorous testing that should result to harmless consequences. It takes 10 years to do clinical trials for a vaccine but scientists are racing to discover it for months, unless hundreds of millions of people will die if we don’t do something now! It took two centuries to perfect smallpox vaccine.

***

(Outdoor) Denver and Manila arrive in Mumbai in spite of a national lockdown around India, the largest sub-continent nation to do so. Inside one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world.

Manila: Hydroxychloroquine, they say this anti-malarial drugs is a game-changer drug in the fight against coronavirus. The miracle drug? By the way, how can we convince India to make a surplus when the rest of the world is still suffering from the pandemic?

Denver: Let’s do what professor has told us to do. Just prepare billions of Indian rupees! I trust your negotiation skills, Manila!

Professor: Denver, do you hear me? (He’s calling them from the satellite network).

Inspector Sierra is arriving shortly to help you negotiate and get the drugs manufactured! Do you copy?

TO BE CONTINUED>>>

Beijing draws flak in launching Ideational Power campaign in the Philippines

Photo from Manila Standard

By Chester B Cabalza

Blogger's Notes:
Commentary of an Academic 
(Copyright @ 2020 by Chester B Cabalza. All Rights Reserved).

The viral song of friendship entitled ‘Iisang Dagat’ (One Sea) launched last April 24 in social media by the Chinese embassy in Manila as a dedication to COVID-19 workers in the frontlines in Beijing and Manila drew flak from netizens in a bid to control an escalating political squabbling amidst the coronavirus pandemic.

The almost four-minute music video penned by Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian gained collective dislike from Filipinos firing clash of opinions and hate messages than drawing mutual empathy between the two neighbouring nations pitted at each other to patch up diplomatic differences on its naval operability in disputed maritime domains.    

China’s foray into ideational underpinnings, an apex of the current geo-strategic commanding heights struggle to reduce health and medical liabilities from Beijing meant at flattening the plateau of the plague. China’s Communist Party builds a gargantuan aid network that runs a reciprocated soft approach to friendly countries, a possible heed of exemplary action to Xi Jinping’s commandments of exporting equipment and expertise on COVID-19. 

The arrival of Chinese specialists on respiratory and infectious diseases last April 5, led by Weng Shangeng, while on medical mission diplomatically applauded the Philippines’ positive, proactive, and effective measures in containing the deadly virus that originated from Hubei province. It complimented Filipino medics’ professionalism and dedication in high rescue success rate, however, maintained further attention in refining detection capacity and epidemic prevention supplies during the exchange of medical experiences.  

Filipinos’ distrust in Beijing rose last November 2019, a month before the coronavirus pandemic spread out of Wuhan, relative to the opposing stand of PLAN in the contested islands claimed by the Philippines. The recently uploaded propaganda music video that promotes co-existence and good neighbourliness stirred another heavy sentiment among Filipinos in dealing with China’s perceived intimidation and collateral damage as the Philippines grieves for the loss of frontline medical workers and other patients who succumbed from COVID-19.  

Confusion on Chinese schizophrenic behaviour over kind clinical extension program on COVID-19 and aggressive military expansion outlook in the South China Sea overlaps the ideational power campaign launched by China in a capacity to champion the Philippines and submit into a condescending cognitive validity or normative value that strongly adheres to Chinese worldview.  

The assertive solidarity expression made by the Philippines and Vietnam last April 8 against China’s standard operating procedures in virtually patrolling all the claimed maritime domains in the South China Sea led to the recent tactical ramming and sinking of Vietnamese fishing boat by Chinese white ship amid the pandemic. Both Southeast Asian nations experienced similar intimidation and coercion by a major naval power in the region.        

On April 23, a warship from the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) threatened a gun-fire at Philippine Navy (PN) ship near Commodore reef in the Philippine-occupied West Philippine Sea. Another maritime commotion occurred last February 17 between the PLAN and PN in a routine maritime patrol when a Chinese corvette relayed an obstinate response transmitted through radio waves about China’s sovereignty rights in the contested waters.

POGOs: A Trojan horse locked in Manila’s rich ghettos

Photo from ABS-CBN News

By Chester B Cabalza

Blogger's Notes:
Commentary of an Academic 
(Copyright @ 2020 by Chester B Cabalza. All Rights Reserved).

As the Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) now placed under the category of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), it deals with online gaming for mainland Chinese gamblers, still considered an illicit operation in China, the golden goose industry employs more than a hundred thousand foreign workers deployed in the country’s major cities, leaving one-third of the workforce to Filipino locals.

Philippine enforcement agencies on public safety and national security quietly work in silo, avoiding a stronger unified command, indulging every bit of compartmentalized strategy in cracking down POGO-related crimes and espionage, skewed to deficiency against organized crimes committed by Chinese nationals, occupying burgeoning cities of Metro Manila construed as a Trojan horse.

POGOs vividly recreate ghettos stirring an imagery of patriarchal hegemony of transnational enterprises imagined in a confluent stringent mafia culture. Unrestricted gambling may extend beyond the glorification of ‘godfathers’ and ratifies trafficking of drugs, humans and weapons.

The popular amusement and leisure offshore gaming magnifies social inequalities and economic injustices that capriciously levels off the playing field of escorting modus that leads to bribery scheme locally dubbed as ‘pastillas’, cyber fraud, contract killing, emerging economic crimes and prostitution. The (re)making of a Chinese ghetto in Metro Manila’s financial districts look auspiciously odd, strategically located in loci that accidentally reconstruct a landscape of cultural acrimony and financial insecurity.   

The influx of Chinese workers attached to diversified businesses opens up to a variety of needs that exclusively cater to their kind and the rest of Filipinos. General precautions on the reverse economic impacts of POGOs subsume greater consideration to the country’s macroeconomic interest.

Economic gray zone

The legitimacy of Chinese offshore gaming’s resumption of operation under the guidelines of the general community quarantine obscured by the coronavirus pandemic is undeniably questioned in spite of the clamour to open up the ailing business. The spike in higher rentals, salaries, and fees for support it unconventionally adds to the country’s gross domestic product has temporarily discredited the momentum of cash flows during the plague. But the Philippine government claims that it could become a milking cow or good source of financial resources to replenish the national coffer to sustain public needs in this trying times. 

Mushrooming online gambling weaves a fabric of major sourpoint amalgamation for the Philippine government and its volatile bilateral relationship with China. Apparently professed as economic gray zone but ambiguously deceived as influence operations swelling to acts of money laundering and tax evasion.

Optimizing the robust trade relations of the Philippines and China, the rise of Chinese companies operating in the archipelago marks proximity in distance and affordability of labor. The real score in booming realty demand and retail spending for Chinese nationals shaped rapid ventures of various sunrise industries and start-ups in the country yet the social backlash that POGOs brought in banes latitude of unpopular policy for its transitional economic gains and explosive liquid assets.

Contrary to China’s total ban of the illegal gambling operation, it constructively appealed to the Philippines to halt any POGO-related activities, a credence that rescinds Chinese moral and social fabric. A successful persuasion of the same economic restriction to cement a strong social cohesion was addressed by Phnom Penh when it banned last year Chinese-owned online gambling in Cambodia. 

Island chain strategy and Trojan virus

On August 2019, the Chinese embassy in Manila raised grave concern for Chinese citizens working in offshore gaming businesses as Philippine authority proposed self-contained POGO boroughs to limit the interaction of local and foreign workers, a prepared blueprint preferably outside of the metropolis to the dismay of Chinese officials that it infringes the rights of foreign operators.   

The most controversial investment eyed for POGO economic hubs raised a red flag on the country’s national security when Chinese investors strategically pointed out Fuga Island in Cagayan province, and adjacent Grande and Chiquita islands in Subic Bay, Zambales province, in a bid to build a Chinese smart city in the northern frontier of Luzon.

A fruition of the Philippines’ bilateral trade relations repackaged under China’s Belt Road Initiative, the planned mega-project would accelerate the value of yuan denomination, advantageously aimed at supporting the giant neighbour’s geopolitical agenda. If approved at that time, the conversion of the three islands into affluent Chinese ghettos makes a gateway of opportunity for China’s naval coordinates as it widens access to the first island chain that connects with Taiwan, a lucid vision for possible reunification with mainland China’s renegade province and lost territory.

The dynamic presence of POGO centres sprouting near military headquarters have conceivably heightened alarms and trepidations on espionage, partly blamed for poor urban-planning and conversion of military bases into commercial spaces. Chinese workers playing chameleon role as spy is not far-fetched from reality. The dangers lurking behind the sophistication of disruptive technology used by offshore gaming operators can invade and pervade critical infrastructures of the country.

Perceived as a Trojan horse, currently imbedded in the Philippines’ vector of economic security, the controversial online gaming industry’s multi-dimensional implications and domino-effect could impinge on public safety and national security. Like a Trojan malware infecting users’ devices or attacking routers of wireless networks, the offshore gaming operations have temporarily propelled economic stimulus to reach projected financial output, birthing to social malady and cyber vulnerability.