Philippines-China Ties Are Strengthening Despite Public Scorn

China is engaged in a coronavirus-era push to simultaneously tout cooperation with its Asian neighbors while confronting them militarily in disputed areas of the South China Sea.

In the Philippines, whose population has long been deeply suspicious of Beijing’s motives, Chinese efforts to enhance the country’s image have gone bust. But that hasn’t sullied the ambitions of China, which enjoys warm relations with the administration of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and appears primed to expand its economic influence as Manila makes public overtures to distance itself from the United States, its longtime security ally.

Antipathy toward China has underscored the entirety of the Philippines coronavirus outbreak, which has seen 14,319 COVID-19 cases and 873 deaths as of May 25 and led to large-scale lockdowns. For instance, the quarantine of the Metro Manila area has lasted longer than the lockdown of Wuhan, where the new coronavirus first emerged. The Philippines initially refused to restrict travel from China out of a fear of harming relations with Beijing, angering citizens before it finally instituted a ban in early February. A subsequent report claimed Chinese visitors entered a tourist destination in Mindanao after the travel ban and were not made to quarantine.

As COVID-19 has locked down much of the country and left most businesses closed, reports of alleged preferential treatment granted to Chinese nationals have continued to anger Filipinos. In early May, some offshore gambling operators – largely controlled by Chinese nationals and serving online gamblers in China – were allowed to resume operations while most businesses, along with churches and other religious gatherings, remained closed. Rappler reported on May 22 that 490 Chinese citizens at one gambling operator received COVID-19 tests, despite testing remaining unavailable to the vast majority of the population. The 70 Filipino employees at the center were not tested, Rappler reported.

Days earlier, Philippine police raided a nearby hospital and pharmacy that was secretly treating Chinese nationals for the coronavirus. The clandestine facility may have been operating for up to three months, Police Brigadier General Rhoderick Armamento said, and likely treated illegal Chinese workers in the offshore gambling sector who wanted to avoid Philippine hospitals, where they could be identified and arrested.

The Chinese government has pushed the Philippines to shutter its offshore gambling industry, but the sector has become symbolic for Filipino public distrust of China’s ambitions. During the Duterte administration – which has been more open to strengthening ties with Beijing than the government of previous President Beningo Aquino III – Chinese workers in the Philippines have borne the brunt of frustrations with Duterte’s decisions not to challenge China’s construction of artificial islands in the West Philippine Sea (the term in the Philippines for the country’s claims in the South China Sea).

In April, the Philippines Department of Foreign Affairs protested China’s “self-declared” and “unlawful” establishment of two new districts in the West Philippine Sea, an area China calls “Sansha City.” The foreign affairs department also said China had pointed a radar gun at a Philippine Navy ship in Philippine waters. Teodoro Locsin Jr., the foreign secretary, called the incidents “violations of international law and Philippine sovereignty.”

But Locsin and Duterte have often disagreed over the Philippine response to China’s aggressive tactics in Philippine waters. Last year, Chinese leader Xi Jinping asked Duterte to “shelve differences” so the two countries could carry out joint oil and gas exploration in the area, and Duterte said he would “ignore” a ruling by a 2016 international arbitration tribunal that recognized the Philippine claims in the contested waters.

Duterte has previously joked about making the country a “province of China,” words that Filipinos have not forgotten: In May, internet users jokingly made posts on Instagram and Facebook geotagged “Philippines, China.” The posts compelled Duterte’s spokesperson, Harry Roque, to label the geotags as “fake news.”

Filipinos have also taken exception to a music video posted to YouTube by the Chinese embassy in Manila highlighting the two countries’ cooperation during the COVID-19 pandemic – in the month since it was posted, the video received 3,900 likes and 215,000 dislikes. And a China-backed radio program sparked online backlash in May after being contrasted with the closure of leading broadcaster ABS-CBN.

But despite public antipathy, Chinese investment in the Philippines has thrived, with the country playing a pivotal role in Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative. Chinese loans finance many signature infrastructure projects making up Duterte’s Build, Build, Build initiative – a program the government has pledged not to shelve during the coronavirus – and China is among the Philippines’ largest trade partners.

Since becoming president in 2016, Duterte has often gone against his own advisers and cabinet officials to pursue warmer ties with China and unwind the country’s longstanding alliance with the United States. Although Philippine-U.S. ties remain strong despite the February termination of the Visiting Forces Agreement, Beijing has ignored public scorn to continue to make inroads in the Philippines as the country combats its coronavirus outbreak.