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The Philippines
This Week in AsiaPolitics

In South China Sea, Philippines is stuck between a pebble and a hard place

  • Manila and Beijing have agreed to disagree on the South China Sea, describing it as a ‘little pebble’ in the road to closer bilateral ties
  • But this sentiment is not shared by many Filipinos, whose trust in China has fallen over this and other issues such as Pogos and the coronavirus

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A protester wearing a boat-shaped hat shouts slogans against China’s incursions in the South China Sea. While Philippine diplomats work to strengthen relations with Beijing, there is strong anti-China sentiment among Filipinos. Photo: AP
Raissa Robles
As Philippine and Chinese diplomats seek to strengthen their relationship and describe the disagreement over the South China Sea as a “little pebble” in the road to closer participation, a survey has highlighted how this view is not shared by many Filipinos, whose trust in China has decreased as the territorial dispute drags on.
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On July 22, Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin, Jnr described the South China Sea as an “avenue of cooperation” between China and the Philippines. “An avenue leading to mutually beneficial economic progress but in that road there is a little pebble called our feature and it’s ours. And on that pebble we might one day stumble and if we stumble it really will be bad, but in the meantime we can go around it. There are other areas of cooperation,” he said.

Chinese ambassador to Manila Huang Xilian on Monday told a webinar hosted by the Manila-based Philippine Association for Chinese Studies and Jinan University’s Centre for Philippine Studies that he agreed with Locsin’s comments. “As Honourable Secretary of Foreign Affairs Locsin said, the South China Sea issue is not the sum total of China-Philippines relations,” Huang said in his keynote speech. “It is just a little pebble on the avenue leading to our mutually beneficial economic progress, and we mustn’t stumble over the little pebble.”

Locsin reacted to Huang’s statement the next day by tweeting: “Agree to disagree on the Arbitral Award. Civilised.”

He added that the dispute remains, and the Philippines and China “agree to disagree and continue disputing each other’s entitlement by law on our part and claim on China’s part”.

In his speech, Huang named three challenges to the relationship between the two countries: the lingering maritime dispute; the negative sentiment on China caused by Philippine politicians who keep on “slandering” the mainland; and “the alarming external disruptions” by some superpower he did not name, but was probably referring to the United States.

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