Philippines: Marcos Jr’s lopsided deals with Trump reach new heights of treachery

Fight Back News Service is circulating the following statement from the International Office of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines.

Marcos Jr’s recent visit to the United States, has demonstrated once again the regime’s deep-seated subservience to US imperialism. His trade and military concessions to Trump have reached new heights of treachery as he sacrificed the country’s sovereignty and economic integrity in exchange for crumbs from his US master.

Marcos Jr boasts of having “lowered” US tariffs from 20% down to 19%, hailing this marginal and inconsequential change as a “win” for Filipino exports. But the real terms of the so-called agreement reveal a lopsided deal squarely in favor of the US. In exchange, the Marcos regime will remove tariffs entirely on US products such as automobiles, pharmaceuticals, wheat and soy. This will only flood the domestic market with US goods, destroy local industries, and deepen the country’s dependency on imported food, medicine, and manufactured products.

Such one-sided deals are not new, but under Marcos Jr, it has reached new heights of treachery. Far from protecting national interests, Marcos Jr is presiding over the wholesale surrender of the Philippine economy and sovereignty.

This economic surrender goes hand in hand with his complete capitulation on military and security policy. Since Marcos Jr came to office in 2022, he has allowed the construction of an additional four EDCA (Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement) sites to be established, making the Philippines a staging ground for US military operations. Even worse, he has greenlit the construction of a US ammunitions factory in Subic Bay, converting Philippine soil into an arms depot for US imperialist weapons of aggression, and in turn invites further tension with China.

Marcos Jr’s visit to Trump was a desperate act of subservience to US imperialism and to Donald Trump himself. With rival political factions maneuvering and the ever-present “reserve horses” of the US waiting in the wings, Marcos Jr is scrambling to secure Washington’s backing to safeguard his hold on power. In effect, he is betraying the nation’s interests to guarantee the favor and protection of his foreign masters.

As Marcos Jr shakes hands with Trump and signs away the country’s future, millions of Filipinos face worsening poverty, inflation, and disaster. Metro Manila and other parts of Luzon were submerged in floods again following consecutive typhoons. Instead of providing urgent relief and owning up to his outright neglect, Marcos Jr dismissed the calamity as the “new normal” and callously told Filipinos to simply “change their mindset.”

Such arrogance cannot mask the fact that billions of pesos have been poured into flood control and infrastructure projects across the country, and yet 25 are left dead while 278,000 more are displaced. Corruption, neglect, and a neoliberal economic agenda have rendered these projects empty showcases while the masses are left to wade through water, lose their homes, and die on the streets.

Almost four years ago, Marcos Jr promised to bring down the price of rice to Php20 per kilo. Today, the average retail price remains at Php44 per kilo or even higher in some places, beyond the reach of ordinary working families. His pledge to end corruption is equally hollow as he continues to siphon public funds through the Maharlika Investment Fund while intoxicating himself in billions of confidential and intelligence funds. Corruption thrives in every level of government while public services deteriorate. Social programs are gutted while his cronies, generals, and political allies enrich themselves in disaster funds, development loans and foreign direct investments.

In the face of the chronic crisis of the semifeudal and semicolonial system, the insatiable corruption of the Marcos Jr regime, and his brazen neglect of the Filipino people’s welfare is pushing more and more Filipinos to take up arms in defense of their lives and land. In response, Marcos Jr unleashes a brutal campaign of state repression through its National Action Plan for Unity, Peace and Development (NAP-UPD), attempting to crush all forms of resistance through intensified red-tagging, mass surveillance, militarization, forced surrenders, abductions, and extrajudicial killings. He continues to refuse the release of political prisoners, including elderly, sick, and long-detained individuals, as part of a broader campaign to silence dissent and criminalize political opposition. This all-out assault on civil liberties and organized resistance is nothing less than Martial Law Part 2, a fascist campaign aimed at preserving elite rule and foreign domination at the expense of the people’s most basic rights.

Halfway through his term in office and as he faces the Filipino people in his fourth State of the Nation Address (SONA), Marcos Jr has only proven himself no different from his plunderer and fascist dictator father and a vassal of US imperialism. The masses’ brewing anger and discontent cannot be contained, and is already beginning to take organized form through the advance of the national democratic revolution. And it is only through waging the struggle for genuine land reform and industrialization that the Filipino people can fulfill their long-standing aspiration for national and social liberation.

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