President Duterte raised the possibility of a US-backed coup d’etat against him due to his pursuit of an independent foreign policy that would stop the country’s reliance on the American government and at the same time warming up diplomatic relations with China.
Saying if ever the US turns its back on the Philippines due to his administration’s war on drugs, which the US and its allies criticized as employing methods that violates human rights, Duterte said Russia and China will definitely welcome him.
Duterte indicated that he might even send Philippine National Police (PNP) Director General Ronald “Bato” de la Rosa to the US to be his rapporteur on the human rights violations against African Americans in reply to the United Nations (UN) and US government demands to allow human rights groups to probe his war on drugs.
Duterte, however, said that Washington might back coup plots against him.
“That’s how America is. Pointing at us... Later on the Americans may instigate coup d’etat, coup d’etat here,” Duterte said Friday in a speech in General Santos City.
“So what if they don’t want us? There is China and Russia, Bato (Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Ronald dela Rosa is going there,” the President added, saying that he is looking forward to strengthen the Philippines’ mutual security ties with Moscow and Beijing.
Last Sept. 11, Duterte said he would prefer American special forces who have been advising local troops battling Muslim extremists to leave Mindanao saying the existence of the foreign soldiers were counter-productive in the government’s peace effort in the region.
Duterte made the statement a week after he called US President Barack Obama “a son of a whore”, causing Obama to cancel their scheduled bilateral meeting at the Asean summit in Laos.
Adanar also warned of destab
Presidential Communications Secretary Martin Andanar earlier warned of destabilization efforts, including the possibility of a coup, against the Duterte administration.
But as for the left-wing National Democratic Front (NDF), such conspiracy theories that the US is out to oust Duterte is due to his leftist tendencies.
Top NDF leader and suspected Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) Chairman Benito Tiamzon said certain elements in the military are against the administration’s peace negotiations with the communist movement, which was a view supposedly fueled by the US government.
“We know that even before President Duterte was elected, there were already elements of the US government and members of some influential groups who were planning to stop the left’s influence on the government,” Tiamzon said in a forum with students of the Rizal High School in Pasig City.
Historically, Duterte’s fears are possible as he has repeatedly noted the predicaments endured by vocal anti-US leaders in the Middle East, particularly Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Moamar Qaddafi of Libya, who were both ousted and eventually killed, allegedly by American infiltrators.
Notably, Bolivian President Evo Morales, in 2008, bared a coup attempt against his government that’s accordingly sponsored by the US whose Ambassador to Bolivia at that time was Philip Goldberg.
Goldberg, who was eventually expelled from Bolivia, is the current US Ambassador to the country and has been a frequent subject of Duterte’s personal tirades, even calling him once as a “gay son of a whore”.
Following a series of expletives against Washington and US President Barack Obama, this is not the first time that Duterte has voiced his intentions to improve relations with US rivals Russia and China.
Earlier this month, the Commander in Chief instructed members of the Philippine Air Force (PAF) to go to Russia and China to learn new techniques in carrying out aerial warfare.
“There are countries that offered us so many, they told me to just simply choose from them. I’d like to tell you, some of our guys there, you can also go there if you want. I’d like to ask (Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana) to chaperon you, technical people, to tour Russia and China and look for what’s more efficient (military hardware and training),” Duterte said last September 13.
Duterte even complained earlier of the country receiving “recycled” weapons, ammunitions and aircrafts sold to the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) but which it can’t use, saying the acquisition of these were “waste of funds.”
“You know, I’ll tell you something… We are a recipient of so many things from America. Thank you for your generosity, but they sold us two—only two F50-A (aircrafts). It’s F50-A, but they never gave us the missiles and the bullets and the cannons to fire from that. That’s why when I was sworn in as Presidents I told them, ‘Do not waste our money on that’,” the President said before the Filipino community in Jakarta earlier this month.
Noise gets louder
Andanar had said earlier some Filipino-Americans in New York are hatching a plan to oust President Duterte by January next year.
He said a Cabinet member, who is in New York and whom he refused to identify, was told of the plan by another Fil-Am who attended the same function.
“I was just talking to somebody in New York now who is also a member of the Cabinet – I won’t mention his name. But he also heard of the Fil-Ams in New York who are planning. They are hatching a plan to oust the President by January 2017,” Andanar said on radio.
He added that he even asked the official if he has evidence to prove it or if this is another hearsay.
“There are stories, there are speculations. But at the same, the surveys will show otherwise because Filipinos in the Philippines are like what you said – more than 90 percent support our President. But then again, if you have all of this news going around internationally, it does not help,” Andanar said.
He said any destabilization initiative would not help the government, considering that Duterte is also being criticized for the extrajudicial killings brought about by the anti-illegal drugs campaign.
Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano also cited a Plan B of the Liberal Party (LP) which targets the ousting of Duterte and to install Vice President Leni Robredo in his place.
He said it centers on discrediting the Duterte administration especially in relation to the number of killings that has reached more than 3,000 in the war against illegal drugs.
Robredo and the LP described Cayetano’s disclosures as “farfetched.”
Kabayan party-list Rep. Harry Roque had warned about the possible plot of the United States to unseat Duterte.
Roque cited Duterte’s scathing remarks against Obama before they met in the ASEAN summit in Laos early this month, and the “coincidence” of a purported witness pinning down Duterte over alleged summary killings.
“The Senate testimony came immediately after the President confirmed he wanted to pursue an independent foreign policy,” Roque observed, referring to Sen. Leila de Lima’s witness, alleged self-confessed Davao death squad member Edgar Matobato.
“It is too much of a coincidence that the testimony intended to pave the way for his ouster came immediately after President Duterte declared his independent stance,” said Roque.
Another factor Roque raised was the background of US Ambassador Philip Goldberg, who has not yet been replaced despite Duterte’s bias against him when he criticized him over the rape-slay of a female Australian missionary in the Davao jail 1988, which was made during the campaign period.
“Remember that US Ambassador Goldberg was kicked out of Bolivia for stirring a coup,” Roque disclosed, noting that “Bolivian President Evo Morales expelled Goldberg out of the country in 2008.”
http://www.tribune.net.ph/headlines/duterte-says-us-may-back-coup-to-oust-him
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