By Fernan Angeles
MALACAÑANG opted to ignore the claim of a hair product labeling Manila as a province of China.
In a televised press briefing, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque warded off calls for the government to blacklist the company behind the Chinese hair care product with a label imprints hinting at the country as a province of China.
“Kalokohan lang po ‘yan. Hindi dapat pinapansin ‘yan dahil wala namang naniniwala na tayo’y probinsya ng Tsina (No one will believe the Philippines is a province of China),” Roque said.
PBA party-list Representative Jericho Nograles earlier asked the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to blacklist the Chinese hair care product Ashley Shine Keratin Treatment Deep Repair which had a label of their address in Binondo, Manila as a “province of the People’s Republic of China.”
According to Nograles, the mislabeling of the product could have been deliberate as it was “hard to dismiss this insult as a simple error.”
Roque said the Palace recognizes the FDA’s “exclusive jurisdiction” to decide on Nograles’ request.
In February 2018, President Rodrigo Duterte joked before a gathering of Filipino-Chinese businessmen about making the Philippines a province of China.
But former Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Zhao Jianhua considered Duterte’s “joke” as a serious desire to forge closer ties with their country.
Relations between the Philippines and China have vastly improved under Duterte, who sought Chinese trade and economic aid while shelving long-running territorial disputes, including the United Nations arbitral tribunal case won by Manila in July 2016.
The ruling invalidated China’s historic claims in the resource-rich waters and spelled out the Philippines’ sovereign rights to access offshore oil and gas fields within its 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone.
“We are proud to be Filipinos and we will never allow [ourselves] to be subjugated by any foreign power,” Roque said.