Opinion | As Western nations back away from Duterte and his drug war, China steps up as key ally for Philippines

“Hounds follow those who feed them,” remarked the great Prussian statesman Otto von Bismarck, underscoring the centrality of patronage to political influence. Something very similar has been taking place in the realm of geopolitics amid mutual estrangement between the West and the Philippines under President Rodrigo Duterte.

The United States has even threatened withdrawal of security aid as well as dialled down cooperation with the Philippine National Police (PNP), which has been accused of widespread extrajudicial killings.

Sensing a strategic opening, China has assiduously made inroads into building rapport with the Philippines’ domestic security forces. Widely condemned in the West, Duterte’s drug war, which has been conducted by the PNP, has seemingly found an unlikely ally in Beijing.

Duterte’s scorched-earth campaign against illegal drugs, which has reportedly claimed the lives of tens of thousands of suspected drug dealers, has severely undermined institutionalised ties between the Philippine domestic security forces and traditional Western partners.

Since the fall of the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship in 1986, Western governments as well as civil society groups have sought to reform the Philippine police and military, which was responsible for widespread human rights violations during the period of martial law.