A nation should defend its territorial integrity

Any Filipino high school student who took his history and geography subjects seriously would tell you that a sovereign state like the Republic of the Philippines, is defined as a community of people, more or less numerous, permanently occupying a defined territory, with a duly established government, imbued with sovereignty and to which the inhabitants render habitual obedience. Thus, there are four elements of a state: people, territory, government and sovereignty.

Well, we have 111 million people, we have a government although not perfect, but even the US is not perfect, and we have sovereignty considering that we can enforce our laws from Batanes to Tawi-Tawi, and we are duly recognized by the international community of nations. We do have a defined territory, albeit China and other claimants are encroaching into our western front, both our territorial domains and our exclusive economic zones. The first article of the Philippine Constitution defines the national territory as that which comprises the Philippine archipelago with all the islands and waters embraced therein, and all other territories over which the Philippines has sovereignty or jurisdiction, consisting of its terrestrial, fluvial, and aerial domain, including its territorial seas, seabed, the subsoil, the insular shelves, and other submarine areas. The waters around, between and connecting the islands of the archipelago, regardless of their breadth and dimensions form part of the internal waters of the Philippines.

The Philippines comprises a total territory of 300,000 square kilometers and has the world's fifth longest coastline of 36,269 kilometers or 22,549 miles. It is bound in the east and the north by the Philippine Sea, in the west by the South China Sea (which we now call, to be politically correct, the West Philippine Sea), and in the south by the Celebes Sea. We have various overlapping maritime zones with several states like Japan, China, Taiwan (which China considers its province), Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, and Palau. As of today, we have settled our boundaries with Indonesia with the signing in Malacañang of the Del Rosario-Natalegawa Agreement on May 24, 2014, which was ratified by the Indonesian Parliament on April 27, 2017 and by the Philippine Senate on June 3, 2019. But we have many unsettled disputes involving the Spratlys, Scarborough Shoal, Sabah, and the Miangas or Palmas Islands.

We have the earliest claims over the 52 landforms in the Spratlys, but we have occupied only five islands, two cays, and three reefs. All the rest are being occupied by Vietnam, China, Taiwan, and Malaysia. We have established a town in Pag-asa (Thitu Island), which we named Municipality of Kalayaan, with only 184 people as of the 2015 census, but with a mayor and a complete municipal council, and all the rest of a local government unit. But we do not have such government in the islands of Patag (flat), Kota (Laotia), Lawak (Nanshan), and Likas (West York), Panata (Lan Kiam Cay), Parola (Northeast Cay), and no presence in Balagtas (Irving Reef), Rizal (Commodore Reef) and Ayongin (Second Thomas Reef). A cay is a low elevation of land masses found on top of coral reefs. A reef is a ridge of jagged rock formation or sand above the surface of the sea.

With due respect to President Duterte, I strongly hold the view that he, as head of state and commander-in-chief of all armed forces, has the constitutional duty to defend every inch of our territory, not by might which we do not have, but by right, by rallying all our allies to put pressure on China to stand back and respect our domains and exclusive economic zones. We cannot give up our national territory because of “utang na loob” or because of the Sinovac vaccine. I am afraid that to give up our territorial integrity would constitute a betrayal of public trust.