by Mario Casayuran and Reuters, Manila Bulletin
Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph G. Recto counseled the Duterte administration to tap local industries in modernizing the military before snapping up a $500-million loan being offered by China to modernize the Philippine military.
“The Philippines must stop relying on foreign suppliers to modernize the military equipment of its armed forces,” Recto said.
Recto gave this advice after Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said the country plans to utilize the loan to procure defense equipment from China.
China has offered to donate $14 million worth of military hardware to the Philippines, plus a soft loan for $500 million in Chinese arms.
But Lorenzana said they plan to use China’s money if the military’s five-year P100-billion ($2-billion) budget for modernization is insufficient.
“There is no need to borrow from China. We should tap our domestic industries for the equipment needed by our policemen and soldiers,” Recto urged.
He cited the existence of a vibrant local firearms industry that has been exporting its products for many decades now.
“Some of them were licensees of world’s leading gun makers,” he noted.
FILIPINO FIRST
There are many of them, from boat builders to vehicle manufacturers to firearm/ammunition makers who can step up to the plate once there are firm orders from the government, Recto pointed out.
“We should look inward and develop our own capability. It is cheaper to produce and maintain them locally, than to import them. That way, jobs are created for the Filipinos and the local industries are given the chance to grow,” he added.
The only equipment or parts we should import, according to Recto, are those which the country cannot produce locally.
“We should not bypass local industries which can provide parts or whole of the defense equipment being sought,” he said.
“Hindi naman pwede na mula helmet hanggang boots (We should not import everything from helmets to boots) imported. If some of the things can be made locally and the products are of the same price and quality as the ones bought abroad, then let us manufacture them here,” Recto said.
Military and police vehicles can be supplied by local car manufacturers. The President’s home province of Cebu , for one can build patrol ships.
“We have a world-class shipbuilding industry in Cebu, but our government agencies have yet to harness its potential as a major source of military and civilian boats,” he stressed.
“Buy local, create jobs. This should be the new mantra of the government,” he added.
CONDITIONS
The United States has provided its defense treaty ally with most of its major hardware, like ships, fighters, helicopters and small arms, but the Philippines is now looking to China and Russia for drones, planes, fast boats and rifles to fight communist rebels and Islamist militants behind an unrelenting spree of piracy and kidnapping, he said.
Lorenzana said acquiring weapons and equipment from the United States had become difficult because the process was slow and there were conditions tied to sales.
“That’s why we are discouraged from getting from them because of these conditions,” Lorenzana told reporters in Beijing.
“We need airplanes, we need drones, we need fast boats,” he said. “We need them in the south so that we can deter kidnappings and bring about development.”
Weapons procurements could also be complicated by bipartisan attempts by some US lawmakers to ban the transfer of arms to the Philippines that could be used in a war on drugs that has killed thousands of Filipinos, and has been condemned by Western governments.
At the sidelines of a Belt and Road summit in Beijing, Philippine President Duterte on Sunday met several Chinese state-owned corporations, including a defense contractor blacklisted by Washington for selling to Iran items that were banned under US laws.
NO DIFFERENCE
Duterte, who is working hard to strengthen ties with China has complained about the useless US “hand-me-down” merchandise given its treaty ally.
Lorenzana confirmed China’s Poly Group Corporation and Poly Technologies were among companies which called on President Duterte and the defense department is sending a technical team to look at the Chinese equipment.
Lorenzana said he signed a letter of intent with state-owned China Poly Group to buy military equipment from but no specific materiel had been decided yet.
“Yes, I signed a letter of intent with Poly Group. (However) there is no specific equipment or arms yet. We’ll let the services decide what they went to acquire from China,” Lorenzana added.
The defense chief assured there is no difference whether Western or China-made.
“The weapons are almost the same now. They are used the same way. Puede namang i-tailor made yung requirements natin (The materiel can be customized according to our requirements). Doctrine and training is peculiar to an Army so it won’t be affected,” Lorenzana said.
He is due to sign a defense agreement with his Russian counterpart next week for possible purchases of weapons and drones. The Philippines is also acquiring drones from Israel. (With reports from Hannah L. Torregoza and Francis T. Wakefield)
IN MY OPINION