Philippines envoy to US to discuss VFA with Duterte

MANILA, Philippines — The country’s ambassador to the United States, Jose Manuel Romualdez, is set to arrive in Manila today to brief President Duterte on how scrapping the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) would impact Philippines-US bilateral relations.

A Palace source told The STAR that Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. had summoned Romualdez from Washington for a clearer perspective on where the bilateral relations stand.

Conflicting reports have come out of Malacañang over the weekend on whether or not Duterte has already given the order to send an official notice of termination of the VFA to the US government.

“Ang importante sa lahat (What is most important), we have an on-the-ground assessment of the Philippine-US relations. That is important at this time, especially in relation to the VFA,” a highly placed source in Malacañang told The STAR.

More sources close to the President said Romualdez may be keen on calling for the strengthening of the country’s diplomatic ties with America, while discussing the pros and cons of terminating the VFA.

Asked how significant the meeting may be with regard to the President’s ultimate decision, the Palace official said: “This is very critical for us.”

It was made apparent by sources in Malacañang that Locsin would accompany Romualdez in the meeting with the President.

Discussions on the advantages and disadvantages of abrogating the VFA, a two-decade-old pact tied to the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) and the Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) with the US, comes ahead of a planned phone conversation between Duterte and US President Donald Trump which was said to take place sometime “soon.”

They said the country’s top diplomats maintain a strategy parallel to Duterte’s foreign policy of being a “friend to all and enemy to none.”

This, they said, remains true notwithstanding Duterte’s having crafted a foreign policy geared toward non-traditional allies such as Beijing and Moscow since he became President in 2016.

In a Senate inquiry last Thursday, Locsin said that abrogating the VFA would render both the MDT and EDCA “nothing but pieces of paper.”

Senate President Vicente Sotto III led his colleagues in the Senate in filing a resolution urging the President to reconsider his plan to terminate the agreement and calling, instead, for a review of the VFA.

Palace sources said that while Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana and other high-level officials respect the President’s call on abrogating the VFA, they are hopeful that the benefits of retaining the agreement would get the better side of Duterte.

It has been two weeks since the President called for the termination of the agreement after learning that the US government cancelled the visa of Sen. Ronald dela Rosa, the chief implementer of the Duterte administration’s war on drugs when he was police chief which has been highly criticized as human rights excesses by US officials.

Meanwhile, some officials in the Palace have called out chief presidential legal counsel and presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo for “being a loose cannon” after causing a stir last Friday when he said that Duterte had already ordered the transmission of the notice to terminate the VFA to US authorities.

That claim was disputed by Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea, who denied having received such an order.