When Chinese errorturns to silver
Credit to Author: Mauro Gia Samonte| Date: Sat, 07 Dec 2019 16:29:44 +0000
“Sorry, my error,” wrote my informant about the name of the new Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines. “It’s Huang Xilian.”
“What an error!” I exclaimed. “Nasa headline pa!”
I was referring to the title of my piece last Saturday: “Welcome, Ambassador Huang Xiling…” And roiling was I, too, that being the flag bearer of an article I purposely meant to stress the significance of the arrival of China’s new envoy. The article dealt in most part on the 74-percent distrust rating among Filipinos recorded by Pulse Asia in its latest survey on the subject matter. How the new Chinese envoy would figure in the issue, I wrote thus:
“This ultimately must constitute the challenge Ambassador Huang needs to overcome in order to start his tenure right. He must win not just the official camaraderie and cooperation of the Philippine government but also, as an essential and indispensable element, the hearts and minds of the Filipino people in their immense number. What’s at the heart of the dismal failure of China in Pulse Asia’s recent trust survey is the continuing onslaught by US rah-rah boys of the Filipinos’ mind, drumming up into the people’s consciousness that China is evil, particularly in its military buildup in the South China Sea.
Sincere people-to-people encounters might just be the key to turning the tables this time in China’s favor.”
My informant would easily challenge that Pulse Asia survey result on China’s trust rating by Filipinos, branding the group: “False Asia.” According to his own information, PEW Research Center, a Washington-based think tank, puts China as enjoying as high as 71-percent trust rating in Russia, a similarly high rating of 70 percent in Nigeria, a relatively comfortable acceptance of 57 percent in Ukraine, and even stevens positive scores with negative ones in most 37 countries surveyed, except US and Canada, which registered 60-percent and 67-percent distrust, respectively.
That, however, hardly changes the overall picture of Filipinos generally distrusting China and Chinese in the Philippines. This has been a long-subsisting phenomenon in the country, which I have been deeply observing and in which I could not perceive a truly sustained effort to counteract, in the same manner, for instance, that America did early on at the start of the John F. Kennedy incumbency. The period saw the establishment of the United States Agency for International Development, with great stress on economic assistance direct to the people. This was quite visible in the decade of the sixties when American Peace Corps volunteers were roaming the Philippine countrysides, making friends with Filipinos, largely those in the grassroots level. Ironically enough, what the Peace Corps volunteers were doing was a literal application of a Chinese teaching: Mao Zedong’s: “Serve the people.”
One time I was on a journey across Negros Island, I was amazed that Peace Corps people were fluently speaking Ilonggo, mixing with locals in a way that manifested no tinges of any animosity at all. So-called progressive blocks are won’t to deride the US poisoning of Filipino minds so that they think and act all things American. But is the US to blame?
America didn’t get that reward on a silver platter. They worked hard for it. If China turns out to be so derided by a large segment of the Filipino populace, China must have itself alone to blame. They hadn’t worked as hard as they had been focusing on friendship and mutual benefits mostly with the Philippine government and its bureaucrats.
I would not pretend to be more knowledgeable than Chinese operatives in the matter of conduct of Chinese foreign relations in the Philippines, but I would disagree with a purely propaganda approach to the problem of Filipino trust in China. No amount of media blitz would erase from the Filipino mind the fact that Philippine economy, culture and politics are by any perception dominated by the Chinese, and when US propagandists bloat out the fact of the National Power Grid Corporation coming under complete control of Chinese stockholders, the fear of total Chinese ascendancy in Philippine society is instantly ventilated across the entire archipelago. You carry out a survey on China’s acceptance in the Philippines during this period, what do you get? A devastating 74-percent distrust.
With the advent of a new Chinese ambassador to the Philippines, here’s privately hoping that some substantial change is in the offing, although I would not go as far as advancing ideas of details of such change. I could only recall the “Yolanda” devastation in the Waray country in 2013. China unceremoniously sent a hospital ship that attended to those needing medical attention. No pomp, no fanfare, just plain serving a people in times of need. Would that 74-percent distrust of China survey result apply to the folks of Leyte and Samar serviced by the Chinese hospital ship that readily came to their rescue when their very President was telling them: “Bahala kayo sa buhay n’yo (Mind your own lives)?”
What needs to be done in this respect, I think, is to make a distinction between politics and people’s livelihood.
Just the past week, I happened to be in my hometown of San Andres, Catanduanes in those three days of Typhoon “Tisoy” slamming across the Bicol region. Power was completely out, and land, water and air transports were totally stopped — effectively isolating the province from the rest of the country. Doing a look-see of the devastation in the areas of poor folks, I was approached by people who had been used to my sister Ellen’s giving little gifts on Christmas. The folks would much appreciate if they could receive this time something for their noche buena, which they said they would no longer be able to provide for, because what little provisions they might still have would not even be enough for the repair of their damaged homes. I passed on the information to Wilson Lee Flores, who has been into giving away yuletide cheers with products of his Kamnuning Bakery Café. I asked Wilson if he would be willing to bring those cheers to as far away as Catanduanes. Wilson, in turn, advised me to send the request to the Federation of Filipino Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industries, Inc. (FFCCII). Knowing how Dr. Henry Lim Bon Liong, FFCCII president, and his able and accommodating Vice President Larry Ng have been promptly responding to such people’s plea for succor, an estimated 500 families worst damaged by Typhoon Tisoy in San Andres, Catanduanes are assured of Christmas cheers nonetheless.
Now, if the incoming ambassador doesn’t come up to my private expectation in this regard, then I only have myself to blame. Mr. Huang could conveniently declare: “You didn’t tell me.” Indeed, I had not referred to him at all, but to another “Huang” who was a “Xiling.”
But, then again, that’s why I’m telling you now. And to make sure you listen, I am spelling
your hallowed name quite correct this time: “Huang Xilian.”
But, hey, does anybody realize what I have just done? From the wrong name “Xiling,” I added “a” to the last “i” and then removed the “g.” Combining the corrected letters, what you get is “ag,” which, in case you haven’t known yet, is the chemical symbol for “silver!”
So, if as pointed out above, US success at poisoning Filipino minds for their anti-China sentiments has not been given to Americans on a silver platter, this time around, the antidote to that poison is being handed China on the silvery correction of their new ambassador’s name.
Welcome, His Excellency Ambassador Huang Xilian.