It has been a colossal hoax pulled off with astonishing success by the pro-American Yellow Cult: that the award handed down by an arbitral panel in the suit brought by former president Benigno Aquino 3rd and his government upheld our rights to the Spratlys and ruled illegal China’s claims. The deception indeed has been so powerful that even my esteemed colleague in this newspaper, whose columns I’ve admired, Fr. Ranhilio Aquino, totally fell for it. In his column last Monday, August 3, he claimed: “The law is on our side. The rights [to the West Philippine Sea] are ours. That was the great and inestimable result of the arbitral ruling.” He made the remark to explain why he disagrees with President Duterte’s stance of shelving the arbitration award, on grounds that the only way to do this was to go to war with China. Fr. Ranhilio says we are a David who should fight a Goliath.

Tiglao, R. D. (2020, August 5). Arbitration suit vs China: A colossal hoax. The Manila Times, pp. A1, A5.