Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte is standing up for that comfort woman statue in Manila. In an interview with MindaNews published Tuesday, he said that to take down the statue would violate the right to freedom of expression.
“That is a constitutional right which I cannot stop. It’s prohibitive for me to do that,” he said.
Last month, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) expressed worry about the statue meant to commemorate Filipino comfort women or women and girls who were forced into prostitution by Japanese soldiers during World War II.
Because Japan remains touchy about this part of history, the DFA was worried that the statue might affect the Philippines’ relations with the country.
“Taking into account the sensitive nature of the comfort woman issue both domestically and bilaterally with Japan, the department requests for background information regarding the monument,” a letter from the DFA said.
In the MindaNews interview, Duterte acknowledged Japan as the largest contributor of aid to the Philippines. The Japanese government is also helping fund various big-ticket projects of the Dutete administration including the PHP300 billion (US$5.9 billion) Manila-Clark rail.
Last week, Japanese Internal Affairs and Communications Minister Seiko Noda raised the issue to Duterte when the two met in the Malacañang Palace. According to Kyodo News, Noda called the statue “regrettable.”
Duterte told MindaNews that to this, he said that he “cannot stop the relatives or even the comfort women still living from their freedom to express what they are expressing through the statue.”
However, he seems to be hands-off on the issue and does not mind if Manila authorities decide to take it down. He told MindaNews that this decision was all up to Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada.
Last Thursday, Duterte’s spokesperson Harry Roque also said that the president won’t act on any concerns regarding the issue and that he is leaving it up to the organization that erected the statue and the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP), which approved of the statue.
The president clarified that the Japenese government has not asked for the statue to be taken down.
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