Senator calls for unified stand on RP territory
By Gil C. Cabacungan Jr., Norman Bordadora
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 02:13:00 03/24/2008
MANILA, Philippines—Malacañang and Congress should come up with a “common stand” to protect Philippine territory through a new baselines bill asserting the country’s claim to the Kalayaan Islands in the South China Sea.
Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. issued the call in the wake of announced plans by the two chambers of Congress to conduct separate inquiries into President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s endorsement of the Joint Marine Seismic Undertaking (JMSU) among the state oil firms of the Philippines, China and Vietnam, which covers areas within Philippine territory.
“It would be ridiculous for the Philippines not to include the Kalayaan Islands within its archipelagic baselines because this is being made precisely in pursuit of its rights as an archipelagic state under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS),” Pimentel said in a statement.
The senator was also reacting to the stalled passage of House Bill No. 3216, which sets the Philippine baselines at a 20-kilometer (12-mile) territorial sea, 41-km (24-mile) contiguous zone and 340-km (200-mile) exclusive economic zone.
The bill was approved unanimously on second reading as early as Dec. 13, 2007. But Malacañang obviously “intervened” in stopping its final passage on third reading in order to incorporate amendments proposed by the Office of the President’s Commission on Maritime and Ocean Affairs, according to Pimentel.
He said the Palace stepped in after Beijing sent a warning note that HB 3216 putting “the Scarborough Shoal and some other Nansha (Spratly) reefs and islands inside the baseline of the Philippines will not be conducive to stability … [and will] also disturb China-Philippine cooperation in the area.”
Malacañang had earlier expressed agreement with a proposal to remand the bill for amendment to the House committee on foreign affairs chaired by Cebu Rep. Antonio Cuenco, its principal sponsor.
Part of RP
Pimentel pointed out that the Kalayaan Islands had been officially annexed as part of the Philippines and had been under its actual and effective control since 1978.
Palawan Rep. Antonio Alvarez, an ally of the administration, on Sunday warned that his province and the country itself would be “dismembered” if Kalayaan were excluded from Philippine territory.
According to Alvarez, the administration may be in violation of Philippine laws if it passes a baselines bill that excludes Kalayaan.
Pimentel said Congress and Malacañang should resolve their differences over the configuration of the archipelagic map without compromising or weakening the Philippines’ legal and historic claim to Kalayaan.
He also said the Senate should give top priority to drawing up the baselines to complement the House’s effort and to meet the May 2009 deadline set by the United Nations.
“It is incumbent upon us to protect and assert our territorial rights over the seas around us, and even to the extent of 200 nautical miles from the edge of our seas as our exclusive economic zone,” he added.
With the admission by Philippine National Oil Co. president Antonio Cailao that the entire 142,886-sq-km area covered by the 2005 JMSU was all within the Philippine territory, Pimentel said: “All the more we should push for a definition of our territory whatever the opinion of other countries may be.”
But he warned against unnecessarily straining ties with China and Vietnam.
Pimentel also expressed concurrence with the view of a group of law professors from the University of the Philippines that Congress should pass the law drawing up the country’s archipelagic map regardless of the reservations of China or any other nation claiming the Spratlys.
The group had said all disputes or overlapping claims would anyway be subject to final resolution in accordance with the UNCLOS.
Sovereignty
According to Alvarez, a member of Ms Arroyo’s political party, the Kabalikat ng Malayang Pilipino, passing a baselines law that encloses Kalayaan will “amount to no more than an assertion of sovereignty over what is ours.”
Kalayaan is “a natural prolongation” of Palawan Island, and they are on the same continental shelf, the lawmaker said.
He said that “to buckle down from this [position] by meekly pointing to only six islands and treating them independently” would be “tantamount to giving up our ownership of the entire Kalayaan, weakening our stance as against the other claimants, and violating our own laws.”
Alvarez expressed frustration over the administration’s purported intent to exclude Kalayaan from the archipelagic baselines.
He said this was “the only logical effect” of remanding HB 3216 to the House committee on foreign affairs and “forcing it to adopt a ‘regime of islands’ position … in effect abandoning the current ‘enclosed within baseline’ option provided by the bill.”
“To treat the Kalayaan island group as individual islands and disjunct from Palawan province is tantamount to dismembering not only Palawan but also our national territory,” he added.
The other lawmaker from Palawan, Rep. Abraham Mitra, had earlier said it was important that the archipelagic baselines include the waters between Palawan and Kalayaan as well.
“The Malampaya exploration is there,” Mitra had pointed out.
Marcos decree
Alvarez said it was then dictator Ferdinand Marcos who declared Philippine “ownership” of Kalayaan Islands through Presidential Decree No. 1596 issued in 1978.
“This decree stated that Kalayaan shall have its own local government, to be known as the municipality of Kalayaan, and shall be part of Palawan province. This law has never been amended, modified, or repealed,” he said.
Under PD 1596, Marcos “asserted the country’s sovereignty over Kalayaan because for him the country owns [it],” Alvarez said, adding:
“It is not a mere claimant. This is quite different from how our government views Kalayaan now. For them, we are mere claimants.
“This is frustrating because, we have long ago established a municipality there and even made it part of the first congressional district.”
Mitra said that despite their being allied with Ms Arroyo, he and Alvarez would continue to push for the passage of HB 3216 in its present form—with the baselines enclosing the main archipelago, Scarborough Shoal and Kalayaan.
He said the people of Palawan “will not stand” for the exclusion of Kalayaan from the archipelagic baselines.
“Malacañang will understand. This is local for us,” Mitra said.
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