By James Hernandez
Former solicitor general Florin Hilbay warned the public against candidates who are in favor of seeking a joint exploration with China in the West Philippine Sea (WPS).
Hilbay reminded in a statement that the Philippines won against China a July 12, 2016 ruling from the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague which recognized the Philippines’s claim over the WPS.
“One of the best ways to preserve our victory is by understanding the grave dangers posed by the MOU (memorandum of understanding) over gas between the Duterte Administration and China,” said Hilbay, who has been an agent of the government in the arbitration case.
“In my opinion, anyone who runs for public office who professes support for his deal with China should be considered a possible Manchurian Candidate,” he warned.
Hilbay pointed this out as he accused retired Supreme Court (SC) Justice Antonio Carpio, one of the founders of of the 1Sambayan which claims to be an anti-Duterte coalition, of having “bragged that the Memorandum of understanding (MOU) with China was cleared with him (Carpio) by people in the Duterte administration.”
“In light of these recent events, I strongly encourage those who belong to or associate with the opposition to carefully scrutinize the claim to credibility and apparent motives of those who seek to unify the opposition against the Duterte administration,” Hilbay urged.
The former solicitor general issued his statement in response to the claims of Carpio in his July 8 column and recent interview on ANC concerning the retired magistrate’s accounts of the arbitration case.
Hilbay cited that the retired magistrate’s admissions during the ANC interview showed that “J. Carpio is in bed with the people inside the Duterte administration in efforts to broker a deal with China.”
Among those Hilbay refuted is the claim that Carpio had stopped the former solicitor general from asking Paul Reicher, the Philippines’ lead counsel in the arbitration case, to exclude the Itu Aba issue before the tribunal.
Itu Aba, a formation in the WPS being claimed by Taiwan.
Hilbay recounted that the tribunal wanted to ask what will happen to Itu Aba if it is declared an island and the proposed answer to Reicchler’s team to this is “to request the tribunal to issue peace-promoting rules ‘pending agreement on delimitation or joint development agreements’.”
“I strongly objected to this fancy and insidious way of inserting joint development as a compromise because it was totally unnecessary; it was a sign of weakness, a case of telegraphing one’s punches,” Hilbay said.
“I was also angry because I had already previously told Mr. Reichler not to bring in extraneous matters such as joint development,” he added.
Hilbay recalled that “Mr. Reicheler’s team relented, conceded my point, and redrafted the problematic portion of the speech.”
“It was only then that I gave the go-signal to deliver the speech, which ended up strengthening our case on Itu Aba and allowed us to win the argument,” he said.
