President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. will arrive in Indonesia on Sept. 4, Sunday, for his first state visit.
Based on an advisory provided by his media team, the President's first order of business is to meet with the Filipino community in the world's largest archipelagic state.
What he will do, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), is to assure the overseas Filipinos of the government's commitment to protect their rights and ensure their welfare.
Then on Monday, Sep. 5, comes the "bulk" of his activities, said DFA spokesperson Ma. Teresita Daza in a recent pre-departure briefing.
According to Marcos' media team, the chief executive will meet with his Indonesian counterpart, President Joko Widodo, who invited him to Indonesia, at his official residence—Bogor Palace.
Bogor Palace is located in West Java, about one-hour away drive from the capital, Jakarta.
In a list of state visit's deliverables provided by Daza to media, the President will witness the following:
• Signing of a Plan of Action between DFA and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Indonesia, which will lay out a comprehensive and action road map for bilateral relations over the next five years
• Renewal of the 1997 Agreement on Cooperative Activities in the Field of Defense and Security (DSCA) between the Philippine Department of National Defense (DND) and the Ministry of Defense of Indonesia, which will serve as mother framework for all defense and security cooperation, and
• Renewal of the Memorandum of Understanding on Cultural Cooperation between the National Commission for Culture and the Arts and the Ministry of Education and Culture of Indonesia, which will promote people-to-people exchanges and mutual understanding through cultural activities of the two countries
Marcos, who will stay until Sep. 6, will not only tackle political matters but also those related to economy. In Indonesia, which is the largest economy in Southeast Asia, he will meet with business leaders to promote trade and investment to support his administration's economic agenda.
South China Sea
The President is also expected to discuss the country's concerns on the South China Sea and the West Philippine Sea.
With Indonesia being the next chairman of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Daza said, "there will clearly be discussions on key regional issues of mutual interest, including the West Philippine Sea or South China Sea issue."
Both Philippines and Indonesia have concerns on the South China Sea.
The Philippines asserts its sovereignty over the West Philippine Sea—a part of the South China—by citing the 2016 The Hague ruling. Meanwhile, Indonesia is asserting its rights over parts of the South China Sea, which belong to its exclusive economic zone and supposedly overlap with China's unilaterally-claimed nine-dash line.
Mary Jane Veloso
The fate of Mary Jane Veloso, an overseas Filipino worker (OFW) who has been in death row for 12 years after being caught with some 2.6 kilos of heroin, remains uncertain.
This came although DFA Secretary Enrique Manalo, in a House hearing on August 31, said the government will "most likely" raise the issue.
"This is one of the issues which we will raise during the state visit," he said when asked by Gabriela party-list representative Arlene Brosas about the status of Filipinos facing death sentence abroad.
On Sept. 2, Veloso's father, Cesar, went to the office Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) from Nueva Ecija to personally give his letter-appeal for President Marcos to appeal for clemency for his daughter.
Daza, in the same briefing, said she was not privy to Marcos' plan regarding Veloso's status and wished not to discuss it further to avoid preempting possible discussions.
Marcos picked Indonesia for his first ever state visit as the 17th President of the Philippines to solidify the country's diplomatic ties with it.
Daza said the Philippines and Indonesia share "an active engagement" in many areas, including security and defense, trade and investment and people-to-people exchanges.
The two countries also have the same extensive porous border and are close partners in maritime cooperation, having concluded a landmark agreement on exclusive economic zone and boundary delimitation in 2014. They are also currently negotiating the delimitation of other continental shelf boundaries.