How we can handle the Jones Cup issue

The Philippine Coast Guard fatally shot a Taiwanese fisherman a couple of weeks back after firing at a Taiwanese vessel that was reportedly trying to ram a Philippine boat within the exclusive economic zone of the Philippines. Investigations have been conducted by several entities and findings seem to conflict on more than a few aspects. Sadly, nobody might ever know what really took place and under what circumstances.

Source: http://ph.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/judgmentcall/handle-jones-cup-issue-094945620.html

The reality though, is that so much has been happening since then. The Philippine government apologized to Taiwan, which basically brushed the apology aside and sanctioned the Philippines by freezing work applications of Filipinos seeking jobs in Taiwan. Reports have come in as well that Filipinos in Taiwan are being abused, discriminated against, or even physically attacked. Critics have viciously panned the Philippine government and its methods in “handling” the matter.

Many say Taiwan is overreacting. Surely, there has to be a better way of handling things. But, despite so many know-it-alls and would-be diplomats on the social media sites, we are all really just waiting to see how the Philippine government, which is supposed to be traveling along the “daang matuwid” (straight path – to where I do not know!), deals with the situation moving forward. As we wait, though, more is transpiring.

In August of 2012, our Philippine Men’s basketball team, known as Gilas Pilipinas, won the William Jones Cup in Taipei, Taiwan, beating an American team in the finals, 76-75. Despite the tournament not having the best teams from the competing countries, the victory was sweet in that many of the known players, particularly from our own basketball region, competed, and Gilas showed lots of character in eking out victories that were of the come-from-behind variety. New members of the Gilas squad showed their wares, and Ginebra guard LA Tenorio was adjudged the tournament MVP.

Fast forward to this year, where the 2013 William Jones Cup is supposed to be held on 06 to 14 July 2013, again in Taiwan, where it has been held annually since 1977. Gilas is supposed to defend its crown, but the fallout from the Taiwanese fisherman’s death has derailed the Gilas bid to repeat in the Jones Cup. Based purely on what I gathered from online news reports and social media sites, shortly after the fisherman incident, tournament organizers informed Gilas that it was still very much included in the tournament roster. However, just a few days ago, the Samahang Basketball ng Pilipinas (SBP) was informed that Gilas was now “un-invited” to the tournament, mostly due to safety reasons.

Coach Chot did not hide his displeasure with this development. Correctly so, he was looking forward to this tournament as one of the bigger steps in the preparation of Gilas for the FIBA Asia Championships that will be held here in Manila from 01 to 11 August 2013. Now, Gilas needs to look for a “replacement tournament” to compete in, to try and get some exposure against competition at or near the caliber of the Jones Cup participants. Supposedly, Gilas officials are “burning the lines” to find a filler for the portion of the team’s training and preparation schedule, which was already allotted to the Jones Cup. Let’s hope our team finds somewhere to play that gives our team the tests that we would want them to undergo before FIBA Asia.

Now, of course there is a clamor to “un-invite” Taiwan for the FIBA Asia Championships in August. I am not sure if we are even empowered to do that, particularly since all qualified teams in the region are eligible to participate with FIBA consent, unlike in the Jones Cup, which is not FIBA-supervised.

On the other hand, I read suggestions that we roll out the red carpet for all participating teams in FIBA Asia, including Taiwan, and show them true Filipino hospitality as the host nation. Pros and cons, yeas and nays, war and peace, lovers and fighters…our countrymen’s, more particularly our basketball fans’, sentiments run the entire gamut of emotions. It made my blood boil when I heard some Filipinos were struck with baseball bats in Taiwan last week. But, would it be right to search for the nearest Taiwanese and do the same, or maybe even worse?

We Filipinos are an emotional people. We wear our hearts on our sleeves and express our feelings out loud very easily, especially when we are cheering for the team we love. Curiously, we are quick to attack anyone that we feel “insults” us in any way, such as foreign personalities who say things about our country that we do not believe are true, or who have the temerity to hurl insults at our nation. We take offense when our capital city is compared to the gates of hell for reasons that might even be true for some observers. We do not like our countrymen to suffer abroad, even when they are jailed for committing crimes there, which would earn our ire and lead us to condemn them if they committed such crimes here. There seems to be so much contradiction, so much irony, and sometimes, so little justification.

The Taiwanese think we (through our Coast Guard) unjustifiably killed one of their countrymen. They are throwing whatever weight they have around, demanding that our government do more than merely apologize. A snowball effect has been created, starting with the Taiwanese government all the way down to many of its citizens, and many of them surely believe that they are correctly condemning our country right now. Some of them want to fight. They want to hurt Filipinos, and maybe the organizers of the Jones Cup, recognizing the high possibility of this happening, are doing us a big favor by telling us to stay away. This is one of the scenarios where we could easily be asked, “What if it happened the other way around?” Imagine if one of our countrymen had been shot dead, seemingly unjustifiably, and our diplomats were up in arms. Would we be reacting in a similar manner as they are now? Could this be considered over-reaction? Food for thought, my friends.

In any event, what happens on the diplomatic front is really not within our control. Time is of the essence for Gilas. In the grand scheme of things, as Coach Chot has done, we must move forward from being “un-invited” to the Jones Cup and continue to hope and pray for the most cohesive and sharp-shooting Gilas team we have ever had, such that regardless of where or whom we play in preparation for FIBA Asia, we will have a team in August that can compete and that will have a chance to make us all proud, as we support them here on our very own home courts. Whether Taiwan will be here in August should not be important. But I sure as heck would love to be there if and when we face them.

Source: ph.sports.yahoo.com by Charlie Cuna