Aquino eyes new envoy to China

The nomination of Domingo Lee should be withdrawn. It is common knowledge that people with Spanish name are the only true Filipinos ( albeit not the sharpest knife in the bunch)!!

Last month, the CA deferred the confirmation of Lee, who claimed to be a godson of President Aquino’s grandfather,  after he failed to answer questions about the Spratly’s dispute.

—- WHAT DUH?… Can’t even answer the Spratly’s dispute?…and Noynoy want him to be as envoy to China?  How incompetent fool is Noynoy trying to do? Is this because Lee is a relative?

What a SHAME…. indeed!!!

- Nominating a new envoy to China is important (Domingo Lee move over), but it is even more important to start crafting a long-term China policy as part of our overall foreign policy.

- China’s rise is inevitable and its geographical proximity immovable. We need to deal with this reality squarely. A waning superpower makes our US ally even more unpredictable, in fact the most unpredictable variable in our foreign policy equation (if we’ll have one).

- Just as we have relied on friends in the US congress and US senate to lobby for Philippine interests, we need to cultivate long-term relationships with Chinese Politburo members at the central government level to win us friends.

- To be sure, there are hawks and doves in the Chinese central government. Winning the right kind of doves will help us fend off Chinese hardliners in the future and avoid tensions. Winning the right kind of hawks will also help us in clarifying to China that we are not part of the US-China battle for supremacy in Asia. Dove or hawk, we cannot afford to be sucked into the US-China conflict.

- At present, our envoys to China and Chinoy businessmen have strong ties to provincial and local official in Fujian, which seems to be where most Chinoys originated from. The next step should be working on broadening and strengthening ties with their central government. SG has done this well and we can learn from how they deftly play the two superpowers.

- FVR, who is known to have strong US ties, is curiously one of the founders of Boao Forum in China. As such, he must have some special ties and exposure to the Chinese politburo. While he is not Chinoy, I think his expertise should be tapped.

“Has the situation changed that changes also the parameters of the ambassador we need in China?” Mr. Aquino said, noting that when he nominated Lee a year ago “the considerations were different.”

You, as the Philippine president, could have anticipated this since there is no lack of academic and security analyses on this subject. Military analysts have written extensively about this thing happening based on Vietnam’s experience.

It’s just you were too bent on rewarding a family friend, and in the process, jeopardized the security interest of the country. Thank heavens that the CA did not confirm your candidate, but had you appointed an ambassador there based on merit, he/she could have been a functioning tool now.

Naghintay lang si Penoy ng magandang dahilan para i-pullout yong nominee nya. Syempre may pride, ayaw mapahiya na yong recommended nya ay ilang ulit ibinasura ng CA…