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Expert slams Manila's tactic of hyping public sentiment and sea provocation simultaneously

Global Times

By Zhang Han Published: Aug 27, 2025 12:16 AM

A Chinese expert on Tuesday slammed tactics by Manila in its attempt to keep provocations in the sea, meanwhile stirring up public sentiment at home, following a ranking Philippine Navy official, citing a poll suggesting Filipinos distrust China, boasted of the resolve to protect the Philippines' rights.

According to the Philippine News Agency, a survey by a private organization called OCTA Research conducted face-to-face interviews with 1200 respondents, claiming that 85 percent of respondents distrust China while 76 percent "strongly" support asserting the country's maritime rights.

The poll also claimed that 74 percent of Filipinos view China as the "greatest threat" to the Philippines.

Philippine Navy spokesperson Admiral Roy Vincent Trinidad asserted the poll result is evidence that the public is well aware of maritime issues.

"This further strengthens the resolve of the Armed Forces of the Philippines to protect and secure what is rightfully ours," Trinidad was quoted as saying, while claiming that "It adds more legitimacy to our stand - and fight - when you know you have the backing of the vast majority of our people."

Ding Duo, director of the Research Center for International and Regional Studies at the National Institute for South China Sea Studies, told the Global Times that the Philippines is pushing two agendas simultaneously: keeping provocations in the sea and stirring up public sentiment at home.

By provoking incidents in the South China Sea, the current Philippine administration is attempting to sustain domestic attention on the issue in order to manipulate public opinion. Meanwhile the government is utilizing so-called polls and surveys to justify their provocations at sea, Ding said.

The two agendas are mutually reinforcing, the expert said, adding that shifting blame on China over the South China Sea issue has become "political correctness" for the incumbent administration, so that pragmatic voices are unable to spread or get heard in the Philippines.

There is abundant evidence to demonstrate that it is the Philippines that has been stirring up troubles and provocations in the South China Sea, analysts said.

A recent provocative intrusion by the Philippine Coast Guard and government vessels into waters near China's Huangyan Dao on August 11 was not an isolated incident but part of Manila's repeated provocations in the South China Sea. The Global Times on August 17 obtained exclusive photos and videos as evidence exposing two earlier instances of dangerous and unprofessional maneuvers by Philippine ships, revealing Manila as a habitual offender that deliberately stages incidents and undermines peace and stability in the region.

In contrast to the negative perceptions suggested by the poll, when Global Times reporters visited Masinloc in 2024, a Philippine town closest to China's Huangyan Dao in the South China Sea, local fishermen showed no signs of fear, distrust, confrontation or hostility upon learning that they were speaking with reporters from China.

In conversations with the Global Times, many fishermen repeatedly stressed, "We are not enemies."