Advice for comrade Duterte from the Great Beyond

President Rodrigo Duterte has been compared by some to the late Ugandan strongman Idi Amin, played by Forrest Whitaker in “The Last King of Scotland.” Were Amin alive today, he would probably send this note to Duterte.

Dear Comrade Duterte:

Greetings from the Great Beyond.. You do not know how much pleasure it has given me to finally have a worthy successor, and one who might even go beyond the work of the master! I, Idi Amin Dada, also known in my time as Big Daddy, had almost despaired of having an heir that would continue the traditions of our tribe.

Like me, you are now under attack from the western imperialist media. They have even compared you to me, thinking they insult you in doing so. Be firm. Spit on these hypocrites, for hypocrites they are. Do they not know that the philosophy and practices of our tribe are based on the teachings of the greatest western thinkers?

Do they not realize that as our father Thomas Hobbes taught us not too long ago, the fundamental law of the Sovereign is to kill or be killed?

Do they not know that, as the great Darwin instructed us, the basic law of life is the survival of the fittest?

Do they not realize that we are devotees of Adam Smith, who taught that competition is man’s basic instinct – though we have made one important amendment, that while Smith prescribed killing off the competition with lower prices, we kill off the competition with the sword?

Do they not remember that the illustrious Nietzsche and Ayn Rand told us that Christianity, due process, human rights, and democracy are ideologies invented by the weak to protect them from the strong?

Spit on these hypocrites, Comrade Duterte. We are the true heirs of the West, not these sanctimonious bastards in New York and Washington and the local hacks that are on the payroll of the New York Times.

My only criticism, Comrade Duterte, is that three months into your reign, you continue to tolerate dissent from the corrupt media and incorrigible critics. I silenced these fools during my first month, sending some some of them as gifts to the bellies of the Kings of the River and the Kings of the Jungle.

Be firm. Do not hesitate. And, as always, shoot first, ask questions later.

Idi Amin Dada

– Rappler.com

Walden Bello made the only resignation on principle in the history of Congress in 2015, in protest at the double standards of the Aquino III administration. He has authored 20 books and is currently senior research fellow at Kyoto University and professor of sociology at the State University of New York at Binghamton.