The other ‘no-nonsense’ president in Philippines stirs up outrage, praise

(The following article was condensed from the June 29, 2018 issue of The Washington Diplomat.)

It’s hard to imagine a head of state who’s more outrageously confrontational, incendiary or vulgar than Donald Trump. Maybe that’s part of the reason Trump admires Rodrigo Duterte so much.

Elected president of the Philippines in May 2016 with 38.5 percent of the vote, Duterte — who at 73 is one year Trump’s senior — raised eyebrows from the moment he moved into Manila’s Malacañang Palace. During a September 2016 press conference, he compared himself to Adolf Hitler, boasting that “Hitler massacred 3 million Jews. We have 3 million drug addicts. I’d be happy to slaughter them.”

That same month, he called then-President Barack Obama a “son of a whore” for criticizing Duterte’s violent anti-drug campaign. The former mayor of Davao also bragged about once tossing a Chinese rape and murder suspect from a helicopter; publicly suggested that journalists “are not exempted from assassination, if you’re a son of a bitch”; labeled Philip Goldberg, former U.S. ambassador to the Philippines, as gay (and also a “son of a whore”); and told shocked business leaders during a recent meeting that “when I take Viagra, it stands up.”

And this past February, he famously ordered his soldiers to shoot female communist rebels in their vaginas — a threat that makes Trump’s “grab their pussy” remark tame by comparison.

That’s partly why Duterte’s chief defender in Washington, Philippine Ambassador Jose Manuel “Babe” Romualdez, advises critics not to take his president’s off-the-cuff remarks too seriously.

“There was some disagreement on human rights issues raised by the Obama administration. It was precipitated by a question asked by a foreign reporter trying to get the president’s goat. The president was angry that he was being lectured,” Romualdez explained in a recent interview with The Washington Diplomat.

“Our president listens to advice, but he doesn’t like advice that’s given publicly through the media. This president is particularly sensitive to people trying to make a show of something,” said the ambassador, who himself used to be the CEO of Stargate Media Corp. and publisher of PeopleAsia Magazine (an affiliate of The Philippine STAR). “But this administration is more prudent in the way it raises issues, and since Trump went to the Philippines, that relationship has changed dramatically.”

In fact, Romualdez recalled that “when I presented my credentials to Trump, the first thing he told me was ‘your president sings like Frank Sinatra [a reference to Duterte’s on-stage performance during the November 2017 ASEAN Summit in Manila]. There’s friendship now. Our relationship has warmed up.”

Envoy is Manila’s Third in D.C. Named Romualdez

Romualdez, a Manila media executive who has never held political office, is president of the Manila Overseas Press Club and vice president of the Rotary Club of Manila. Unlike the man who named him ambassador, Romualdez thinks carefully before he opens his mouth to speak.

But when he does, he expresses only admiration for Duterte.

Romualdez is his country’s third ambassador to the United States with that surname.

The first was the brother of the current envoy’s father (at the same time another brother was speaker of the House of Representatives). The second was a cousin of his father. But the family dynasty is not why he was selected to represent the Philippines in Washington, the ambassador said.

“In the Philippines nowadays, there are no more name brands,” he said. “It’s perhaps because the president has read many of my columns and feels I’m the best person to communicate what his program is to a host country like the United States.”

In fact, the first time Duterte offered Romualdez the job in September 2017, he declined. Later he said OK, but postponed the appointment because of upcoming eye surgery.

“He asked me again in July last year, and I said, ‘Mr. President, I will do it for you.’ He responded: ‘Don’t do it for me, do it for the country.’”

‘Worst Human Rights Crisis’ Since Marcos Regime

Romualdez, who in November 2017 took over from his predecessor, the highly respected José E.Cuisía Jr., said Filipino-American relations are good, despite differences in many areas.

“Generally, the relationship remains pretty solid,” he said. “Our military agreements are being followed. Our president has said that whatever defense treaty we have with the U.S., we will honor.”

Despite the condemnation Duterte has received from other world leaders, back at home, the president retains wide swaths of popular support. His pledge to root out corruption, bridge the country’s vast inequality gap and streamline its notorious bureaucracy — instituting a nationwide complaint hotline, for instance — has been met with cheers. At the same time, Transparency International notes that corruption has actually spiked since Duterte took office.

Romualdez insists that when Duterte talks about “killing” drug traffickers, it’s a misnomer.

“When you say that, it sounds like you’re putting a gun to their head,” he said, calling it instead an act of resistance or self-defense.

The ambassador justifies his government’s all-out war on drug dealers on the restive island of Mindanao because of the links he says exist between traffickers and terrorists.

According to Human Rights Watch, Duterte “has plunged the Philippines into its worst human rights crisis since the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos in the 1970s and 1980s.” The New York-based group says his war on drugs, launched in June 2016, has claimed an estimated 12,000 lives of mainly poor urban dwellers, including children.

‘Fake News’ and a White House Invitation

It is perhaps ironic that Romualdez, a former media executive, says he has little patience with “fake news” — the kind Trump fumes about, and the kind the ambassador himself says distorts the truth, especially when talking about Duterte’s alleged human rights abuses.

“We media people love intrigue; that’s how you get stories. So, you try to lure a person to say something so you can quote him. Our president has told journalists, ‘I don’t really care what you say.’ Sometimes media people have a tendency to think they’re God’s gift to the world. This president doesn’t really care. It also sends a signal: ‘You better write something that’s correct.’”

He added: “If I could say the same things he does, I’d do it, but I’m wearing a different hat now. I created a few enemies when I was a columnist, so whenever I got threats, I used to tell them to take a number.”

A number of issues still separate Washington and Manila — most notably Trump’s get-tough attitude toward immigrants, even those who are in the U.S. legally.

“We’re here to obviously assure our friends in Congress, the State Department, the White House and the Pentagon that our relationship is solid,” Romualdez said when asked whether he was worried. “Regarding immigration, obviously we’re expressing our concern. But every time I talk to these legislators, one thing I hear from them is the good reputation Filipino workers have in this country. I hardly ever hear anyone say they don’t like Filipinos.”

Meanwhile, Romualdez predicted his country would see GDP growth of 6.7 percent this year, with even faster growth in 2019. The Duterte government plans to spend $175 billion on basic infrastructure over the next five years, and also aims to bring down the percentage of Filipinos earning less than a dollar a day from the current 24 percent to 14 percent by 2020. *

About the Author: Tel Aviv-based journalist Larry Luxner is news editor of The Washington Diplomat.