China
China’s Strategy: Elite Bribery Behind Duterte Impeachment, Says Military Official
Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte faces impeachment due to alleged corruption involving receiving 319 million pesos from Chinese firms. Military officials warn this reflects Chinese influence operations amid rising territorial disputes. Duterte denies allegations, calling them politically motivated, while concerns grow over national security.
MANILA – If Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte accepted funds from Beijing to grant political favors, it would fall directly within standard operating procedures for Chinese foreign influence operations, a Philippine military official told Radio Free Asia.
The remarks came after prosecutors in the vice president’s impeachment trial presented evidence of the alleged corruption – a financial forensics accountant testified that Cale88 Foods Corp., controlled by Duterte and her husband Manases Carpio, received 319 million pesos (US$5 million) from state-run Chinese firms. Duterte said the allegations were politically motivated.
The revelations raised alarm bells, with Filipino officials and experts immediately raising the specter of Chinese spy and malign influence operations as the two countries have become locked in an increasingly tense territorial dispute in the South China Sea, parts of which are claimed by Manila and referred to as the West Philippine Sea.
Gaining access to the most influential people in a target country is a fundamental malign influence strategy for Beijing, retired Rear Adm. Roy Vincent Trinidad, spokesman for the Philippine military in the West Philippine Sea, told RFA.
“Part of the rulebook of the Chinese Communist Party includes economic elite co-optation and political elite co-optation,” Trinidad told RFA. “If they could co-opt a political leader, have him elected by building him up politically through foreign malign influence, they would have achieved the objective without firing a single shot.”
While donations or grants by any government are not illegal per se and are governed by rules, if the supposed investments are “used to advance the position of our adversary…it will have very serious national security implications,” Trinidad said.
“When another country would like to occupy your territory, would like to sow false narratives to advance their interests, they are creating trouble not only domestically, but in the region,” he stressed.
Going bananas?
Duterte was impeached in May for large-scale corruption and death threats against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., her former political ally turned nemesis.
The prosecution on Oct. 13 dropped three of the charges – misuse of funds, bribery, and grave threats – to speed up the trial, but she still remains accused of having unexplained wealth.
During the trial proceedings earlier in the month, the Anti-Money Laundering Council said the funds paid to the food company controlled by Duterte and her husband were in suspiciously high amounts for what they had been reported as – payment for banana chips, and that the firm did not have the operational capabilities that matched those payments.
The defense cited customs records that showed outgoing banana chip shipments with a declared value of 217 million pesos ($3.4 million), which is still about 100 million pesos less than the payments received.
Additionally, the trial revealed that the company had only two employees, which Senator-Judge Joel Villanueva during the proceedings said was “alarming” considering the company’s reported revenue and sales.
Government officials cannot be the direct beneficiary of funds from any foreign government, Leila de Lima, one of the prosecutors in Duterte’s impeachment trial, told RFA. She called the case a “substantiation of financial infusion by China” to influence.
“VP Sara’s receipt of funds from China without any exempting justification such as a legitimate business squarely constitutes a betrayal of her oath and disloyalty to the Philippines,” she said. “There can only be one reason for the receipt of hundreds of millions of pesos in monetary benefits by a public official from a foreign government.”
China’s Embassy in Manila did not immediately respond when contacted by RFA. But in a short statement it issued on Oct. 5, the embassy urged “relevant individuals in the Philippines to stop political manipulation and not drag Philippine domestic politics into China-Philippine relations.”
“A serious matter”
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., talking to reporters during a visit to Singapore on Oct. 11, acknowledged that the prosecution’s allegations were a “serious matter” that needed to be…
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