The Philippines had never been an independent country until the recent post war era. Over the past millennium, it has been occupied by Chinese, Russia, Japan, Spain and the US. But those reporting and historically documenting political and economic events also hold the indigenous people responsible for the ongoing plight of poverty of the common Philippine people. Ranging from gangs of kidnappers, killers(some embedded in poorly paid military and police forces), extortionists, private armies, warring tribesmen, et al, the same corruption we see all over the world, but at a higher tempo and far more visible. In some cases, these organized groups held strong convictions regarding the need of a new social order, as the solution to end political corruption, to implement land reform, and end the order of wealth oligarchy. Their ideology, the textbook Marxist method of violent change,  fighting poverty and exploitation to implement a superior social and economic order, was compelling to many who have known despair and poverty all their lives. The typical poverty stricken Filipino may not have been intellectually acquainted with Marxism, but simply participating in the activities organized by the Marxists offered some meager level of economic advancement, and perhaps a hopeful way of advancing to a fairer society in their mindset(of course, history bears out a trail of failed states who have gone “drank the Communist kool-aid”). 

As a primary example of status quo corruption and kleptocracy, it started from the top when Marcos was president, whereby he managed to acquire an estimated $9B(1986 dollars), most of it spread around in offshore bank accounts. He and Imelda were said to be one of the wealthiest families in the world, even after their exile(Unbelievably, Imelda returned to the P.I. in 1991 to enter politics where she was elected to the House of Representatives, and ran for president twice, unsuccessfully). The Philippine government has only been able to repatriate a fraction of the stolen wealth.

The P.I.’s southern islands of majority Muslim population has historically been a hotbed of insurrection. Two disparate groups identified are the Moro National Liberation Front(MLNF, who often associate themselves with the Mujahadeen), and the Communist Party of the Philippines(CPP), aligned with Luzon’s NPA. The Moros advocated for a breakaway Muslim state for its Muslim majority. The CPP advocated for a thorough communist regime and social order change by violent means. These groups operated along similar lines to the Viet Cong, taxing the locals through extortion, hit and run ambushes, kidnapping, farmer by day, fighter by night. The offshoot of the MLNF was the MILF(Moro Islamic Liberation Front) who trained in Afghanistan and practiced jihad, and operated a military base, Camp Abubakar, in virtual impunity from outside forces, until the Philippine military was eventually brought in. The MILF fought the government forces to a draw, ending in a truce brokered by none other than Moammar Khadafy. Khadafy had been politically active in the Indonesian Muslim territories, quite adjacent to the southern Philippine Islands. Southern island tribal disputes often occur between the MLNF, the CPP, the MILF, in addition to government troops attempting to defend many of the newly relocated, non-aligned peoples. RC Christians tended to be the majority of local victims.  The fighting has had the effect of scaring even the local rice farmers away, fearing war would engulf their fields. Said by a Muslim resident “people prefer to bear arms than ploughs”. This internecine strife routinely goes unchecked, resulting in kidnappings and extortion of international business executives and contractors, throwing a cold towel on business development in the Visayas and Mindanao.

It was unfortunate that President Aquino, shortly after becoming president, set Joma, a Huk political enemy, free. Joma dreamed of resurrecting the Huk movement, now rolled into the NPA, into a hard core Maoist organization that would come to power under violent means.  It has been discovered that it was in fact Joma’s NPA that was responsible for the 1971 Plaza Miranda bombing. The tangible organized violence is what led Marcos to declare Martial Law in 1972. It was said the NPA had forces in excess of 25,000 men throughout the Philippines. RC clergy on one hand sympathized with many of the NPA causes(land reform, fair wages) but could not embrace their violent means. The visible component of the CPP and NPA, through which the Philippine government communicated, was the National Democratic Front(NDF). Negotiations were entered into by the gov’t in an attempt to stem the bloodshed, and make the P.I. a viable investment to locate business operations. Finally in 1997 at The Hague, a lengthy round of talks commenced between the NDF(on behalf of the CPP and NPA) and the Ramos administration. The talks stalled on the subject of legitimizing the NDF, something the Philippine government would not accept.  Small scale attacks began to ramp up once again, and a peaceful settlement was never arrived at. 

Throughout the history of the Philippines, runs a common theme of greed(among pols and many businessmen), violence, anti-foreignism, and anti-Chinese. The Chinese have had a long standing historical presence as businessmen in the P.I. Indeed, it is said that most of the (non-corporate) restaurants and hotels are owned by those of Chinese lineage.  The resentment of their privileged status has made them targets for ransom kidnappings and violent attacks.  These and the collective other NPA kidnappings have gone as far to have a Political and Economic Risk Consultancy rank the Philippines last among Asian nations for safety and security(7.2 out of 10). It was stated that paying the police and civil servants better would be a great start, many who currently live as squatters, given their $100./month average salary, but the funds weren’t available. The average Filipino seems to have accepted their own impoverished state, a newspaper stated after the 2nd People Power Revolution, led by the repatriated Imelda Marcos, “Was it a Revolution or really a transfer of power from one group to another in the ruling class”. Reform is difficult to execute without adequate tax revenue, when many powerful businesses don’t pay taxes due to sweetheart deals. While the country was drowning in debt, Cory Aquino was said to have borrowed more money in her 6 years than Marcos did in his 20 years. Yet carrying forward through 2000, the miracle had yet to arrive…the gap between the top 10% and bottom 40% was in fact widening.  

Philippine foreign policy expert Dick Romulo has said that the main benefit of closing the US bases was political, it robbed both the left and the right of their common issue: neo-colonialism. Between 1986 and 1991, a reported $750M of US aid, and $4.2B of Japanese aid poured into the P.I. From 1992 to 1995, an additional $365M US and $2.3B Japanese aid arrived. Thereafter, annual aid to the P.I. averaged $50M US and $1B Japanese.  The money is distributed through the Asian Development Bank. However this investment money typically finds its home in soaring office towers, 5 star hotels and restaurants, and other entities that do not reach the rice paddy farmer. Even the funding earmarked for clearing and building lahar dikes, post-Pinatubo, exchanged so many hands, that there was not enough left to buy the essential materials(cement, rebar, etc.) and lahar dikes wound up constructed with “gated” lahar itself which naturally failed in short order.  This of course would never hold under the enormous straining weight of the backed up lahar flows, especially with the rains. The trickle down economy never reached those most thirsty. The problem appears to be an entrenched class of the corrupt, most of whom rub elbows with one another. Not a single person was prosecuted after the Marcos dictatorship and grand theft. Not even Imelda who returned to a non-hostile system that elected her to the legislature, and could not recover money stored in overseas bank accounts. Not all Filipino politicians are corrupt, but enough have been entrenched for many decades, corruption is virtually institutionized and part of doing business, so there always seems to be forces in play to perpetualize their influence. As one of the Imelda Marcos’s unsuccessful prosecutors in their failed bid to convict her and recover stolen national assets(in fact,$400M out of the estimated $9B, or <5% was recovered) Solonga was  quoted as saying “Debt from within, cronyism, is part of our culture”.  

Corruption, graft, bribery, etc. is of course not exclusive to the P.I. It can be found, perhaps hidden better and practiced in a more “sophisticated manner”, in virtually all governments to a certain extent. The difference between the P.I. and other Asian countries where this is documented, is that the money derived this way in the P.I. does not find its way back into the Philippine economy, but migrates overseas. In such an environment, it is not surprising to find that the Philippines’s greatest export is people, the Overseas Filipino Workers(OFW). In the year 2000 roughly 7 million Filipino OFW’s were working overseas mainly in countries who need workers not afraid of dangerous, dirty, and often menial jobs.  These OFW’s, given their almost disposible/replacible status, incur a much higher than average fatal accident and injury rate. But given the near absence of living wage jobs locally, they are happy to send home their $50./week, a wage unheard of for the common Filipino in the P.I. Of course, the OFW job finding agencies(where the real money was made) would first require a finder’s fee from the prospective employee as high as $5,000.  But the OFW workers were glad to pay it for employment as domestic servants in Singapore, for example, making 10 times as much as their salaries as educated teachers in the P.I. In the 1990’s, 75% of the indigenous workers in the P.I. sat below the poverty line.

One glimmer of a better future in the Philippines was found in their under-fished seas, a natural resource surrounding the islands, but on a small scale by banka boat and small vessel fishmen who had not sought to  over-extend their catch capacity. The USAID program, a US investment organization for the P.I., had completed a study concluding the Sarangani Bay region in southeast Mindanao, would facilitate the best site for a world class Philippine fishing port and trading hub. It was named Gensan(for General Santos City) and supported the construction of a deep water port, a 10,000 foot runway airport, all surrounded by rich fisheries and agricultural land. Indeed, American and Asian agro-interests had already established a foothold in the area. A “gold rush” mentality swept the region with international investment joining in to construct the infrastructure necessary to facilitate its operations. Despite the construction jobs, wages paid to the Filipinos remained well below what is considered a fair living wage. And the legacy tradition of payola, or pay first to play, either stalled, derailed or created budget over runs. The benefactor of payola could be anyone in the engineering, management or government role of the project(for that matter, anyone throughout the supply chain may get involved in this practice).  One issue cited was gross underpayment of professionals,  who then sought to equalize by means of the entrenched payola system. Thievery was the norm given the sites were guarded by grossly underpaid Filipinos, who either looked the other way when armed gangs appeared, or themselves participated in the pilferage. “Dynamite fishing” became popular, destroying the coral eco-system where the fish had existed. Although Davao, a few hours drive north of Gensan on Mindanao, had earned the dubious distinction of the world’s murder capital, the contagion began to spread to Gensan. Kidnapping for ransom was becoming routine. The project’s leader, LaVerne Humphreys, remarked that this was the worst corruption he’d ever seen in 35 years, having worked in Indonesia, Africa, and many other 3rd world countries. The outcome of the violence and corruption was that many of international investors began to pull back their interest in operating in the P.I. and sought alternative Southeast Asian locations. At stake were the potential windfall profits, jobs and well being of the Filipinos in the area. Indeed, in 1997, a USAID official stated it was the last year of USAID participation in the Philippines.

The Spratly Island chain, northwest of Mindanao, has been claimed a possession of the Philippines since the 1800’s. They extend beyond main cluster of Philippine Islands in the South China Sea. The Red Chinese(PRC) has initiated encroachment on a number of these small islands, and atolls, constructing largely by emptying heavy rock fill finished with cement, what appear to be small airbases and ports for light ships and boats. This appears to be one of the initial manifestations of China’s expansionary goals. Chinese hardliners consider not only Taiwan, but the South China Sea, as within their sovereignty.  In addition, a host of smaller countries which exist in their general vicinity have also taken claim to a number of the islands(see maps below). Perhaps the Philippine leadership might have considered their exposure from all sides of their islands to foreign intervention. Once the US bases were turned over to the Philippines, what used to be secured by a country-wide network of US radar, aerial, and naval patrols was now left exposed as if by invitation.6