Alan Cayetano admits going to China, asks if US spying on PHL

Senator Alan Peter Cayetano on Friday admitted going to China in June as US Ambassador Philip Goldberg recently said.

Cayetano said that he would at the proper time file a report on his China visit but scored Goldberg for rumor-mongering and even spying.

Goldberg had said that the administration was already in talks with Chinese officials even before President Rodrigo Duterte took his oath on June 30.

Duterte in his recent state visit to Beijing said that he was separating the Philippines from the United States.

He explained in Davao City upon his return that the country would no longer follow the dictates of the superpower.

Duterte has also indicated that he wanted stronger ties with China and even Russia.

"I am writing a letter to Secretary Yasay. I informed him yesterday to complain and to protest the actions of Ambassador Goldberg," Cayetano said in a news briefing in Malacanang.

“Is this an admission that they are spying on us? On a Cabinet member and on a member of the Senate? Is there anything wrong, malicious of me going to anywhere, to China?” he added.

Cayetano, the chair of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, said he went to China on his own initiative.

"Ako iyon. The President doesn’t tell people to go and as I said I’ll report to the Senate and the at the right time," Cayetano said.

The senator is Duterte's choice to head the Department of Foreign Affairs and is expected to take over the department when the one-year ban on appointing losing candidates lapsed in 2017.

Cayetano was Duterte's running mate in the 2016 presidential elections.

The senator said he would write Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfeco Yasay Jr. a letter to complain about Goldberg's pronouncements.

Goldberg had also alleged that Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade also went to China to meet officials there in June.

Tugade has denied Goldberg’s claim. Cayetano on Friday vouched for the transportation secretary.

“Is the US Ambassador engaged in tsismis and in rumormongering and in false information? Because Secretary Tugade did not go. He had a lot of invitation," Cayetano said.

"I heard him say, ‘I will not go abroad until I form my team and my priority is forming the DOTr team,’” he added.

While he admitted that he indeed travelled to China, Cayetano said that he met with Goldberg at one time.

“I met with him. I did not publicize that I met with him. Did he talk about my talk with him? No. The way he threw it in the interview was like his parting shot," Cayetano said.

"At the right time, I will make a full report if at all I’m doing something, whether it is in my initiative or I was directed to. Remember I’m a senator. I don’t need the President to tell me to do something,” he added.

Cayetano said that he as a senator he was free to meet his counterparts whenever and wherever he travelled.

The senator also said that the problem with Goldberg was that he refused to admit that he made a mistake during the elections by not meeting Duterte during the presidential campaign and commenting on his controversial rape joke. 

“He made the mistake during the campaign in handling the candidates. He met all of the candidates and reported to the US. I suppose that was the procedure. But he was not able to meet with Mayor Duterte then because he kept on changing the schedule and making hard for the meeting. That was his mistake," Duterte said.

"Second, he interfered with the election. There was a lot of American influence. He made a comment on a highly politically charged issue,” Cayetano explained.

To drive his point home, the senator asked what would happen if the Filipino ambassador to the US made comments about a certain American presidential candidate.

“Can you imagine if our ambassador in the US says something that, ‘You know what itong treatment ng isang candidate sa babae dapat ganito, ganyan.’ And it affected the 3.5 million Filipino Americans there... Don’t you think they will expel that ambassador?" Cayetano said.

"But ang bait ng President natin he met with him. Nag-one on one sila. But did the ambassador stop there? He continued to treat Malacañang as if you can tell the Philippine President what to do,” he added. — NB, GMA News