The role of USAID or US Agency for International Development in the Philippines as a US instrument came to focus after its newly-seated president Donald Trump declared that he would close the said agency.

“The agency constitutes America’s ‘soft power’, in contrast to its ‘hard power’ the Central Intelligence Agency,” policy studies director and CenPEG (Center for People Empowerment in Governance) vice chairman Prof. Bobby Tuazon said.

“Soft power” is where decisions and and behaviors of citizens, groups, organizations or states are molded through enticement or persuasion instead of coercion or violence. It shapes the desires of states, organizations, groups or citizens without using overt coercion, but aiming for the same result it desires.

In the case of the Philippines, the US has used USAID, not to help the country, but to curb social dissent among people who have been lingering in poverty and injustices for decades, Tuazon said. CENPEG has long questioned the agency’s true motives in the Philippines, especially since many of the groups and programs it funds are tied to counter-insurgency and not to programs that promote genuine economic and social development.

USAID is involved in projects aligned with US geopolitical interests in the fields of governance, security and economy.

“The long-standing issues of poverty and inequality in the Philippines will not be solved by foreign aid programs that serve only as tools for political influence,” Tuazon said.

“The real path to national development lies on self-determined policies that uplift the marginalized, not in externally dictated agenda.”