Former Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea on Tuesday revealed during a hearing of the House Committee on National Defense and Security with the Special Committee on the West Philippine Sea that the “gentlemen’s agreement” between China and the Philippines was brokered in 2013, during the administration of late President Benigno “Noynoy” C. Aquino III.
Medialdea served as the executive secretary of former President Rodrigo Duterte. The former chief executive has been implicated in the said agreement with the Chinese government.
The former Palace official said he got wind of the commitment to deliver only food and water to the BRP Sierra Madre stationed off the coast of Ayungin Shoal “when the decision came out 12 days after we assumed office.”
Medialdea pointed to former Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin as the one who entered into the supposed agreement with former Chinese ambassador to the Philippines Ma Keqing.
The secret agreement came three years before the United Nations-backed Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling quashed China’s claims over the disputed territories in the West Philippine Sea.
As its response, Medialdea said, the Duterte administration respected the agreement sealed by Gazmin as a continuing commitment.
However, congressional leaders on Tuesday criticized Duterte and his administration for choosing to pursue a status quo or “walang galawan” policy on Ayungin Shoal despite the country’s July 2016 arbitral ruling that the area is part of the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.
Legislators called out the Duterte administration after Medialdea told them that they opted to respect a supposed commitment—that only food and water would be delivered to Filipino soldiers stationed in an old navy vessel—made by former defense secretary Gazmin to then Chinese Ambassador Ma Keqing.
However, the former Palace official could not present any proof of the alleged Gazmin promise, while Gazmin’s successor, Delfin Lorenzana, said he was not aware of it.
A Department of Foreign Affairs representative said she was not aware of such a commitment.
Medialdea, Lorenzana and another Duterte official, former national security adviser Hermogenes Esperon, handed over their testimonies to the joint committee hearing.
Iloilo Rep. Raul Tupas, defense committee vice chairman, and Mandaluyong City Rep. Neptali Gonzales II, chair of the Committee on the West Philippine Sea, jointly presided over the inquiry prompted by a resolution and a privilege speech asking the House to investigate the alleged secret agreement.
Gonzales said assuming the Gazmin promise really existed, the fact remained that former President Duterte did not disturb the status quo in Ayungin even after the Philippines won its case in the Permanent Court of Arbitration on July 12, 2016, 12 days after he assumed the presidency.
“The arbitral court declared that Ayungin was ours, that we have sovereign rights over that area. We could have done what we wanted to do there — in fact, we could do anything — but we did not,” he said.
Rep. Ramon Rodrigo Gutierrez of 1-Rider party-list group said the Duterte administration’s decision to preserve the status quo in Ayungin came as a “shocking surprise” to him.
He said less than a month into office, the former president was already aware of the country’s arbitral victory over disputed areas in the West Philippine Sea, including Scarborough Shoal, Mischief Reef, and Ayungin Shoal.
“But they did not change the status quo,” he said.
Gutierrez informed his colleagues and the committees’ resource persons that he searched the internet and found that the alleged Gazmin promise did not exist.
“My initial finding is that the commitment was not to build new structures,” he said.
He stressed that the “status quo” policy of the Duterte administration therefore stood on “shaky foundation.”
Responding to questions from committee members, Medialdea said he heard about the supposed Gazmin promise when he made an “off the cuff” query from one official whose name he could not remember.
On the other hand, Lorenzana said Gazmin “transmitted no such thing to me when he briefed me.”
He said despite Duterte’s status quo policy on Ayungin, the Philippine Navy started repairing “our soldiers’ housing quarters in BRP Sierra Madre in Ayungin to make them comfortable.”
“That’s when the Chinese Coast Guard started blasting us with their water cannons. They thought we were trying to strengthen BRP Sierra Madre,” he said.
For her part, Rep. France Castro, nominee of ACT Teachers party-list group said the statements of Medialdea, Lorenzana, and Esperon that no gentleman’s agreement was made on Ayungin Shoal “prove that all those assertions by China that such an agreement existed are all lies.”
To give Gazmin a chance to clarify things, upon Castro’s motion, the two committees decided to invite him to its next hearing.
The hearing panels later suspended its public hearing and opted to hold a closed-door session to listen to testimonies on issues Tupas said could “border on national security.”
The Tupas and Gonzales committees have also invited former Duterte spokesman Harry Roque, who has claimed Duterte and Chinese President Xi Jinping really had a secret deal on Ayungin.
Meanwhile, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said Tuesday it has yet to receive an official directive from President Marcos to investigate the alleged wiretapping of conversations about a supposed “new model” deal on Ayungin Shoal.
“No, no, no… I have not received any instruction,” Foreign Affairs Secretary Enrique Manalo said in an interview in Taguig City.
Manalo revealed that the DFA would act on the matter, depending on the available evidence.
“If we find any evidence, obviously, we will take whatever action (is) considered necessary,” he added, noting that “this applies to all diplomats.”
The Chinese Embassy earlier claimed that the AFP Western Command (WESCOM) reached a “new model” agreement with China, allegedly approved by the Philippine government and the Department of National Defense (DND).
However, Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro, Jr. denied this.
The diplomatic row between Manila and Beijing has intensified following several confrontations between Chinese and Philippine Coast Guard ships at Ayungin Shoal and Scarborough Shoal. Both locations are within Manila’s exclusive economic zone and are also claimed by China.
