The Rodrigo Duterte phenomenon revisited

IN his first 100 days as president, Rodrigo Duterte did what no other Filipino leader had ever done: 1) he showered US President Barack Obama with a profanity-laced tirade (for supposedly failing to show respect for the sovereignty of the Philippines) in September 2016; and (2) he announced an earth-shaking pivot away from the United States and towards China during a state visit to Beijing in October 2016.

Clearly, these two incidents are connected, and may even have a causal relationship. As I wrote in an article (entitled "Early Access to Covid-19 Vaccines and Rodrigo Duterte-style Vaccine Diplomacy") for the Busan University for Foreign Studies' Suvannabhumi journal recently, Duterte was desperate to align the Philippines' foreign relations with domestic politics. To be more precise, Duterte's foreign relations were realigned to accommodate his war against illegal drugs. In fairness to Duterte, he was convinced that his mandate from the Filipino people — resulting from the 2016 presidential elections — revolved around tenaciously prosecuting the war against illegal drugs.