By BENJIE OLIVEROS
Bulatlat perspective
(Continued from yesterday)
FORWARD a few years later, Quezon was already dead and Manuel A. Roxas was elected as president.
Roxas reportedly did not object to most of the proposals of the US regarding the retention of US military bases, which included that the United States would acquire the bases for ninety-nine years (article 29), that Clark Air Base alone was to cover 130,000 acres, that the city of Olongapo was to be totally part of Subic Naval Base, that US authority would extend to the “vicinity of the bases” (article 3), that the United States would be permitted to use public utilities and all other facilities under conditions no worse than those applicable to the Philippine armed forces (article 7), that the Philippines could not give third nations base rights without US approval (article 25), or that Filipinos were to be permitted to volunteer to serve in the US armed forces (article 27).
Roxas merely objected to two provisions: the establishment of military facilities in Manila and the provision granting the US military jurisdiction over all criminal offenses committed by US Armed Forces personnel.
However, a few senators objected to the proposed military bases agreement.
Sen. Tomas Confesor declared that the bases were “established here by the United States, not so much for the benefit of the Philippines as for their own.”
He warned his colleagues that “We are within the orbit of expansion of the American empire. Imperialism is not yet dead.” “Parity” and the bases agreement.”
Confesor said parity rights and the bases agreement, “complement one another. In the first, we deliver into the hands of the nationals of the United States the natural resources of the country. In the second, we relinquish our sovereign rights over practically every portion of the Philippines, to the end that the United States may properly protect the investments of her citizens in this country.”
Sen. Alejo Mabanag stated that: “Fundamentally and in principle, I am opposed to the establishment of bases in our country because it constitutes an encroachment on our sovereignty. Not only that, while years ago military bases were considered good defenses, [in] this age of the atomic bomb, such bases are no longer sufficient defense. On the contrary, they are an invitation to attack.”
The US-RP military bases agreement of 1947 was nevertheless passed by the Philippine Congress. The only concession the US gave was that it did not establish a military installation in Manila. The US dangled military aid to have the agreement approved. The Roxas government used this aid against the peasant unrest in Central Luzon.
In the United States, the administration decided to consider the bases pact an executive agreement, thus requiring no Senate approval. (sounds familiar?)
The author of the article Why and How the US-Philippine Military Bases Agreement of 1947 Got Approved Stephen R. Shalom noted: “That the United States had rushed massive amounts of military equipment to its bases in the Philippines in the six months before Pearl Harbor to no avail or that the impregnable British base at Singapore was quickly overrun by the Japanese Imperial Army might have suggested that foreign bases were hardly a guarantee against invasion and conquest. ”
On the other hand, the Philippines sent troops to Korea in the 1950s and Vietnam in the 1960s.
Parallel to the negotiations for the retention of US military bases is the push for the enactment of the Bell Trade Act of 1946, which, among other things, contained the controversial “Parity rights” provision, which grants US citizens the same rights as Filipinos in doing business in the country, including the right to exploit the country’s natural resources and to operate basic utilities.
The Roxas government then used the argument, which is still being used now, that granting parity rights to US citizens would attract more foreign investments and therefore, result in economic development.
One of the most consistent in opposing “parity rights” was the late Sen. Claro M. Recto. The following are some of his arguments lifted from the Recto Reader and published by The Filipino Mind.
“This parity clause, it need not be said, is grossly unfair. This is, indeed, the first instance in history where an independent nation has granted to citizens of another rights equal to those enjoyed by its own citizens.”
“Parity opens the door to foreign direct investment. In fact, foreign investment constitutes the very motivation for parity rights.”
“With foreign direct investments financing our industrialization, and with the economy passing gradually into foreign hands, not only shall we be poorer than ever but even our political independence would dwindle into insignificance.”
“Inasmuch as profits and savings therefrom are the only sources of capital formation, those profits that belong to foreign capital can not help promote our own capital formation; consequently, there is no increase in our capacity to produce. “
“We remain, in the end, poor and underdeveloped, When foreign investors send home their income, capital, and savings, then we shall be back where we were before they were ‘attracted,’ perhaps in a worse condition, where we might even have to beg the foreign investors to keep their investments in the Philippines not to enrich us but just to be able to give some employment to our laboring class.”
Well, the rest is history. The Philippines lagged behind its neighbors in economic growth, in real terms. The Philippines could not even build a decent bicycle out of materials produced in the country.
The debate over the “Framework Agreement on Enhanced Defense Cooperation” would not only bring back the US military bases that the Filipino people were able to kick out in 1991.
Worse, it will allow the establishment of US military installations in and expand access of US troops, aircraft carriers, warships and submarines, fighter jets and drones, and war materiel to every corner of the country, including what the late president Roxas objected to, in the capital. In fact, reports reveal that the US has a military installation inside Camp Aguinaldo, the headquarters of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.
Likewise, the moves to amend the economic provisions of the 1987 Constitution to allow foreign-owned corporations to penetrate every sector of the economy practically brings the country back to the time when US businesses enjoyed “parity rights” in the country under the Bell Trade Act of 1946.
The Laurel-Langley Agreement of 1955, which replaced it, made parity rights reciprocal, effectively limiting the rights that American businesses could enjoy in the Philippines.
When the Laurel-Langley Agreement expired in 1974, the Marcos dictatorship replaced “parity rights” with investment incentives such as tax holidays, tariff-free importation, freedom to repatriate profits, among others.
With the current push to remove the economic restrictions in the 1987 Constitution, the Aquino government is bringing the country back to 1946. Worse, “parity rights” would be practically granted to ALL foreign corporations and citizens, not only Americans.
There is truth in what a political economist once said: History does repeat itself, first as tragedy, second as farce. (Bulatlat)
