RP should be helped, not punished

RP should be helped, not punished

Mely Caballero-Anthony
The Straits Times
Asia News Network
Singapore

It has been two weeks since Filipino truck driver Angelo de la
Cruz was released by militants in Iraq after the Philippine
government bowed to the captors' demands to withdraw its troops
from Iraq.

President Gloria Arroyo's decision to recall the troops less
than a month earlier than scheduled has been widely criticized,
particularly in the United States and Australia, on two counts.

One, the withdrawal meant that the Philippines reneged on its
commitment to the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq and, in effect, to
the war on terrorism.

Part of the possible fall-out of the Philippines' action is a
re-assessment of U.S.-Philippines relations, which had recently
been revitalized after a decade-long hiatus following the closure
of U.S. military bases in the country in 1991. U.S. Ambassador to
the Philippines Francis Ricciardoni has returned to Washington
for urgent consultations with the "people in Washington (who)
will be the ones making decisions, reassessing bilateral
relations".

Given this turn of events, a number of concerns arise: Will
Washington now reconsider its financial aid for the country's
development and cut military support for Manila's battle against
domestic insurgencies and terrorism?

The dictum that "all politics is local" bears reiteration
here.

For the millions of Filipinos who find themselves trapped in
poverty-stricken conditions, it is the responsibility of their
elected government to address not only the challenges of economic
development, but also to ensure that their security is not
compromised in the name of an "abstract" principle of not caving
in to terrorists.

The plight of de la Cruz touched every Filipino with a family
member forced to work overseas because of unemployment at home.
According to official figures, there are some eight million
(registered) Filipino contract workers abroad, who remit close to
US$9 billion (S$15.6 billion) back home.

The heightened emotions fanned by de la Cruz's possible
decapitation could have triggered a cataclysmic backlash by this
massive force and brought down Arroyo's administration. If this
had happened, it would only have provided fodder to the
communists and Muslim insurgents who want to destabilize the
government.

The hostage crisis has shown that the Philippines cannot be an
effective ally if the government in power is weak, and cannot
muster enough domestic support to remain committed to the U.S.-
led coalition. U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's recent
statement that "weakness is provocative" should indeed be heeded
-- but for reasons other than the ones he had in mind.

Indeed, it is precisely because a state is weak that it needs
to be helped.

Still, the onus is clearly on the Arroyo government to
convince Washington that the country remains committed to the
global fight against terrorism. This would mean that beyond
trying to justify its actions in Iraq, the government should now
seriously confront the problem on two fronts.

Firstly, it has to show visible progress in its own local war
against terrorism. Arguably, Arroyo could insist that the fight
against terrorism begins at home. But the Philippine military,
being the major recipient of U.S. military aid and counter-
terrorism training assistance, must be able to show its
capability to fight terrorism and insurgency.

Meanwhile, having offered crucial assistance to the
Philippines, the U.S. cannot now afford to leave the Philippines
alone in this battle.

Secondly, the much bigger challenge for the Arroyo government
is to address some of the root causes of its people's
insecurities -- poverty, corruption and other related issues that
insurgents and terrorists can use to challenge and destabilize
any regime.

The writer is an assistant professor at the Institute of
Defense and Strategic Affairs.