Not whole PH EEZ traditional fishing ground; Scarborough Shoal only – ex-officials

July 24, 2019

Only the Scarborough Shoal was identified as the traditional fishing ground by Filipino, Chinese and Vietnamese fishermen and not the entire exclusive economic zone of the Philippines based on an international tribunal ruling in 2016, two former senior government officials said Tuesday.

Former Foreign Secretary Albert Del Rosario and former Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales, both staunch critics of China, made the statement after President Rodrigo Duterte, in his 4th State of the Nation Address last Monday, said he was allowing Chinese in Philippine waters as decided by an arbitral tribunal in 2016.

But Del Rosario and Morales, in a joint statement, said that China's fishing rights do not cover the entire Philippine EEZ.

They said that only Filipinos are entitled to fish in the country's EEZ under the Constitution.

They wondered why Duterte supposedly kept "secret" the fishing agreement with Chinese President Xi Jinping during their meeting in 2016 in Beijing.

"A crucial question is: why was this agreement secret and hidden from the Filipino people for nearly three years?"

"The answer can only be that this agreement manifestly contravenes our fundamental law – the Constitution," the former two officials said.

Coastal nations have the right to explore, manage and exploit resources as well as undersea oil and gas deposits within their EEZ, which covers 200 nautical miles from their shores.

When Duterte assumed the presidency in 2016, he decided to take a softer stance with China and to shelve The Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration award to the Philippines, invalidating China's historic claim over almost the entire South China Sea through its nine-dash line theory, covering even the EEZ of other neighboring countries, like the Philippines.

The international tribunal ruled that no country can claim sovereign rights over the Scarborough shoal being a traditional fishing ground for Filipino, Vietnamese and Chinese fishermen. China has been rejecting the ruling.

Scarborough Shoal is located 124 nautical miles off the nearest Philippine landmass of Palawan and 472 nautical miles from China’s nearest coastal province of Hainan.

Del Rosario and Carpio-Morales, insisting that the country's EEZ is reserved and exclusively to Filipinos, said that Duterte's deal with Xi was "illegal, null and void."

"Unless the Constitution is amended, no public official has the authority to grant foreigners fishing rights in our EEZ," they said. DMS