Panelo on Duterte’s silence on ship sinking incident: President already spoke through alter egos

President Rodrigo Duterte has not made a public statement about the sinking of a Philippine fishing boat by a Chinese vessel but his spokesperson said Friday he already did through his alter egos in government.

“He has already made a statement through his presidential spokesperson and chief presidential legal counsel as well as his two other alter egos, Secretary of National Defense and the Secretary of Foreign Affairs,” Palace spokesman Salvador Panelo said in a text message to GMA News Online.

Panelo said the statements included an expression of outrage and calls for an investigation and punishment for those responsible for the June 9 incident in the vicinity of the disputed Reed (Recto) Bank.

The Malacañang official added in a separate interview on ANC television that the President is a  “very cautious man” who makes “calibrated responses” to issues.

“Depending on the incidents. When the President speaks, they are intentional to get some desired effects or sometimes as he calls it he shakes the tree for reactions,” Panelo said.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. tweeted that all Cabinet members are the President’s alter egos.

“All Cabinet members are so; didn't anybody go to school or at least take first year first semester Con Law?” Locsin said, referring to constitutional law, in response to a message on Duterte being silent on the matter.

“It is the constitutional order we adopted: elected president has last word on everything. And the elected president is president even of yellows out to destroy him because same order says: he who is elected is president whether you like him or not. Principle of succession.”

Duterte has delivered three speeches in Mindanao since Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana disclosed the boat-ramming incident to the media on June 12, Independence Day.

But the President never talked about or made any reference to the incident.

In these speeches, Duterte discussed the communist insurgency, party-list system, war on drugs and corruption in government, trash from Canada, climate change and investment scams as well as his security and critics. 

Earlier in the day, detained Senator Leila de Lima criticized the silence of Duterte on the abandonment of 22 Filipino crew whose boat was reportedly hit by a Chinese vessel in the waters off Reed Bank.

“President Duterte himself met this issue with his trademark deafening silence in the face of Chinese aggression and misconduct,” De Lima said in a handwritten note from her detention cell at the Philippine National Police Custodial Center.

“Gising na po, Ginoong Duterte. Ipagtanggol mo naman po ang mga Pilipino,” she added. — RSJ, GMA News