My answer is YES he has made the Philippines more dangerous for foreigners and his own people as well. I have lived in the Philippines since 2009 and I consider Duterte a menace to society, specifically to human rights, and an extremely negative role model for the betterment of the Filipino way of living moving forward.
Obviously, my experience is totally different than most other foreigners who have written an answer here. But let me tell you that since Duterte has been elected, I have seen so much violence, dead bodies, bullets flying, unexplained crimes, and police infringement on human rights where the law is simply short-circuited. In the past 18 months alone we have seen 3 deadly shootings in or around our neighborhood. People laying dead on the side of the road in blood pool still fresh and running on the soil. In addition, three weeks ago, two dead bodies were dropped in the middle of the night literally in front of our commercial property with headshots for good measures, we heard those shots. That makes for a total of 5. We don’t even live in the so-called “troubled” area of Greater Manila.
I’m sorry but we have 2 school children and this has gone too far. NEVER did this happen before. We had regular road accidents with fatal casualties, few skirmishes in the evening due to drunkenness but never anything like this and of this magnitude. Yes, I understand that we are NOT the target here but bullets are flying. Innocent people are being injured or killed. And let’s not forget that foreign nationals are still being taken hostage and even killed at times by none else than Duterte’s undeserving trusted law enforcement (case in point Korean kidnapping last year).
I am Caucasian from Canada with deep humanitarian beliefs and respect for every human life. And, as someone mentioned in his answer, no I do not have a generous pension, in fact NONE to speak of. I must still hustle to earn a living and provide for my Filipino family. So please save me the sermon of the white guy not understanding anything of the Filipino struggles.
What is scary for me is that violence brings on violence. The issue for me is that Duterte does not appear to prioritize issues in a logical fashion or in a smart way. Logical thinking would dictate that one would NOT have prioritized the war on drugs as the No 1 priority before addressing more pressing issues. I say this because NO one in their right mind would have started such war knowing how corrupt the police force is and has been. Look up the records and look at the top 10 list on corruption from the office of the Ombudsman and see who made the No 1 position for most corrupt for the past 6 years running! He is NO Lee Kuan Yew, although ruthless in his own right, that man was a brilliant strategist and visionary with deep Asian values. The records shows that Duterte seems to fall short when it comes to strategic planning or regards to human lives. Did 12,000 Filipinos really have to die?
No! The Philippines No 1 priority was and still is CORRUPTION. Simply addressing this issue head on would have produced significant improvements on the drug proliferation problem and without the bloodshed. Revision to the criminal system (he’s a lawyer he should see the need for this) could have been implemented already to expedite cases involving abuse of power and ill-gotten or unexplained wealth, and literally start to reinstate a national sense of ethics that has long been lost at all levels of governments. The bar needs to be raised several notches higher before things start to get better.
I have written about this before, Poverty, Corruption and Education should be the HIGHEST priorities for the Philippines in order to have any hope to regain the glory of its past. A past when most South East Asian countries used to envy the Philippines’ position. Anything else, in my opinion, is being done as a personal vendetta and most likely for personal gain.
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