A story of being left for dead

June 9, 2019 is a day that would become infamous. For on that day while 22 Filipino fishermen were resting after being at sea for more than a week of fishing they would be awoken from their slumber by a crash and their boat rapidly sinking.

I could imagine the terror they felt when the waters came rushing in, hitting the cold waters and to surrounded by darkness.

They cried for help and saw the boat that crashed into them circle back turn on all its lights and check the wreckage.

I could imagine the despair they felt when the boat turned off their lights and sped away leaving them for dead in the high seas.

The captain at that point felt that they would die. Yet a spark of hope lit up as they saw another ship's light about five miles away.

With their lives at stake he asked two of his men to row out in a small canoe they had and ask for help. It took them two hours of rowing to reach the unknown vessel. Turned out to be a Vietnamese vessel.

After 3 hours they were rescued by this Vietnamese boat and the Philippines Coast Guard contacted.

I watched as the captain tearfully recalled their ordeal at sea and that feeling of being left for dead. He was positive that the vessel that crashed into them was manned by the Chinese.

The hardwork they did for the past week, all the fishes caught and the boat they use for their livelihood destroyed but at least they are all alive.

credits to Inquirer Newspaper

Now the Chinese government has given their statement that what happened was an ordinary maritime accident wherein the Philippine fishing boat did not have lights on and that there was no collision but rather a steel cable hooked into the Philippine boat and managed to tip it over.

The picture of the scuttled boat does not look it tipped over.

Now they had every intention to save the drowning fishermen but was "besieged" by 7-8 other Philippine boats and that they were afraid that things might get violent and so once they made sure that the fishermen were being rescued by the other boats they left the area.

What a load of crock! If there were other boats nearby then there would have been no need to row 5 miles to another unknown vessel.

If it was an accident and not an intentional ramming then if there were other boats, which I highly doubt, then they would have stayed and helped rescue the fishermen instead of running away like a guilty party who knew what they were doing is wrong.

This happened in an area under the Territory of the Philippines which the Chinese vessel had no right to be in. Then there was the intentional ramming of the boat to sink a competitor.

I could imagine the laughter and bravado they would have been feeling in sinking another one of those pesky Filipino fishermen who has been repeatedly harrassed, bullied and threatened to be sunk by the Chinese Navy for fishing on Philippines sovereign waters.

I see the anger of my fellow Filipinos as China belittles this event as a simple misunderstanding.

I see the anger of fellow Filipinos as the government remains silent because they do not want to anger China.

May this be a wake up call for us and let us not forget June 9, 2019.