November 28, 2025
MANILA – Red and gold lanterns swayed above the narrow corridors of Diliman College in Quezon City, Metro Manila, where paper dragons snaked across the walls, and a papier-mache woman in traditional Filipino attire stood nearby.
For a moment, the modest community college felt like a mini-Chinatown as Chinese diplomats, Chinese-Filipino businessmen and Filipino scholars made their way through the decorated halls after the launching ceremony of the Philippines-China Studies Center on the college premises on Nov 18.
The opening of the centre raises fresh questions about Beijing’s influence networks in the Philippines, just as public trust of China hits record lows, said analysts.
Centre director, Filipino political analyst and international studies expert Rommel Banlaoi, told The Straits Times that it aims to address Filipinos’ “trust deficit” with regard to China and to rebuild relations between the two nations engaged in what may be the most volatile period of maritime friction over the South China Sea in years.
The centre hopes “to overcome the extent of Filipino public ignorance” and generate “real empirical knowledge essential to promote mutual understanding”, he said.
“There’s more to Philippines-China relations than the disputes in the West Philippine Sea, and there are aspects of this relationship that we need to treasure,” said Dr Banlaoi, 55, a Chinese-educated security scholar.
The West Philippine Sea is Manila’s term for the eastern parts of the South China Sea that lie within its 200 nautical mile exclusive economic zone, but which Beijing claims as its own. A 2016 arbitral ruling invalidated China’s sweeping “nine-dash line” claim over the disputed sea, but Beijing has refused to recognise this.
The centre’s establishment comes at a complicated moment, not only because Filipinos’ distrust of Beijing is at a historic high, but also because of the web of networks, personalities and geopolitics that surround it.
While the centre bills itself as an academic hub to “correct misconceptions” about China, the timing, messaging, and VIP attendees from the Chinese Embassy in Manila have sparked speculation about who is really funding and shaping it.
Its debut comes weeks after a Beijing-steered United Front Work Department-linked, pro-unification gathering in Manila, and amid ongoing concerns about China’s political messaging, diaspora mobilisation and alleged interference in local corruption protests – leaving some political observers to wonder whether the centre is simply an academic initiative or Beijing’s soft-power push in the Philippines.
The Oct 19 gathering of overseas Chinese groups for a forum at a Manila hotel was organised by the Philippine Council for the Promotion of Peaceful Reunification of China. It is part of a global network under the China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful Reunification of China, a core arm of Beijing’s United Front Work Department, which steers its overseas influence.
Charge d’Affaires Zhou Zhiyong of the Chinese Embassy in Manila was a guest at both the centre’s launch and the Oct 19 event.
This back-to-back visibility has raised questions among analysts about how Beijing is cultivating academic partners in the Philippines at a time when its coast guard is firing water cannon, blocking resupply missions and routinely harassing Filipino sailors and fisherfolk in the South China Sea.
“We’re seeing China’s incursions, bullying behaviour almost on a daily or weekly basis. China cannot soft power its way into rebuilding that strategic trust,” said Dr Aries Arugay, senior visiting fellow at the Singapore-based ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute.
Maritime security expert, Dr Collin Koh, of Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, sees the new centre as part of Beijing’s global campaign to “tell the right China story”.
He said similar initiatives exist in other countries like Australia, where local front-facing institutions are led by domestic academics, but have goals that are aligned with a broader push to reframe China’s global image.
“This is not a new approach that China is using,” Dr Koh said. “Of course, that could also mean China trying to put forth narratives that will potentially whitewash some of its more coercive actions, like in the South China Sea, because this is all part of telling the positive side of what it’s doing”.
Man at the helm faces scrutiny
Dr Banlaoi rejects this Beijing-centric framing. He stressed that the centre is purely academic, focused on people-to-people exchanges and dialogues, as well as broader interactions through talks and forums centred on Manila-Beijing relations.
“If there is messaging we want to promote, it should be aligned with the interests of the Filipino people,” he said.
Still, Dr Banlaoi faces scrutiny due to his past associations with China-linked groups, raising concerns about neutrality. Hence, his leadership of the centre will inevitably shape perceptions.
As detailed by Filipino journalists Marites Danguilan-Vitug and Camille Elemia in their book Unrequited Love: Duterte’s China Embrace, Dr Banlaoi has been associated with China-linked groups and has taken positions aligning with Beijing’s preferred approach in its relations with Manila. These include opposing expanded US access to Philippine bases and promoting joint patrols in the South China Sea between Manila and Beijing.
Ms Vitug and Ms Elemia wrote that Dr Banlaoi’s perceived closeness to Beijing “alarmed” the Philippine security establishment during the administration of former Philippine president Benigno Aquino III.
Internal memos from top defence and security officials a decade ago cautioned the military and intelligence community against engaging with him.
In 2022, Dr Banlaoi’s nomination as deputy national security adviser to Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr was derailed after an unsigned complaint from supposed Philippine National Security Council employees accused him of being a “seller of information” and a “security risk”.
Dr Banlaoi denies the allegations, calling them unfair and rooted in geopolitical double standards.
“If Japan or the United States does soft power (moves), we call it diplomacy,” he said. “But if China does it, it’s a bad thing. Isn’t that a double standard?”
Analysts believe that perception itself will be the centre’s biggest challenge.
Dr Koh said: “There are those in the Philippines who see Rommel as having a dubious track record when it comes to dealing with China. He will find it difficult to position himself as neutral.”
A Filipino school with Chinese heritage
Diliman College, where the Philippines-China Studies Center is located, is a small, Filipino-owned private educational institution for students aged 16 and above, founded in 1998. Corporate records obtained by ST show no direct Chinese financing as at June 30, 2025.
But the school has ancestral links to China. The college’s current president, former senator Nikki Coseteng, is the granddaughter of Mr Eduardo Coseteng (Chinese name: Xu Youchao), the first mayor of Xiamen in Fujian province in 1932.
He was born in Fujian and later moved to the Philippines, where he co-founded Equitable Bank. Ms Alice Coseteng, Mr Coseteng’s daughter and mother to Ms Coseteng, is among the Chinese-Filipinos listed as founders of Diliman College.
Ms Coseteng’s remarks at the Philippines-China Studies Center launch, where she said that the South China Sea should be “a bridge” rather than a barrier between Manila and Beijing, echoed the themes of friendship-diplomacy promoted by local civic groups close to the Chinese Embassy. Leaders of such groups were also present at the launch.
None of these associations proves Chinese government influence. But analysts Dr Arugay and Dr Koh said that taken together, this web of relationships shapes how the centre is perceived.
‘Vulnerable’ in the absence of foreign-interference law
Dr Banlaoi said that the centre is funded through Diliman College and will not receive money from either the Chinese or Philippine governments, saying such support would “give political colour”.
He said visiting Chinese scholars and the organisations they are working with will shoulder parts of their own travel or hosting costs. He also plans to tap into Chinese-Filipino associations for possible funding in the future.
Dr Koh, however, noted that influence operations often rely on indirect funding channels rather than explicit state support.
“There’s always the issue about funding from indirect sources,” he said.
Dr Arugay added that academic institutions remain “very vulnerable” in the absence of a foreign-interference law in the Philippines.
“One must always bear in mind that China’s aggression is constant. You can’t blame some academics for approaching China with severe distrust, even cynicism,” he said.
Dr Banlaoi rejected suggestions that his centre fits any covert pattern. He said the goal is to create spaces for dialogue between Manila and Beijing.
“We want to contribute to the peaceful settlement of our disputes,” he said. “We want our centre to have a role in rebuilding confidence between the two governments.”
The simmering tensions between Manila and Beijing, however, may prove to be the centre’s toughest test. It is trying to build academic bridges at a moment when trust itself has become the rarest commodity in the South China Sea.
Additional reporting by Michelle Ng