Sen. Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa wrongly tagged the Philippines as the country with the longest coastline in the world.
STATEMENT
In a Nov. 27 interview with CNN Philippines, Dela Rosa, a former police chief, was asked how come billions worth of imported illegal drugs are still able to enter Philippine shores.
He said:
“Well, palagi naman nating sinasabi eh iyong ating bansa eh napaka-porous iyong ating borders, ‘di ba? (we have always said our country has very porous borders, right?) We have the longest coastline. And dahil (because) anywhere, along that coastline, makapasok doon iyong coming from the outside na mga barko (ships from the outside are able to enter).”
Source: CNN Philippines, The Source: Sen. Bato Dela Rosa, Nov. 27, 2019, watch from 3:15 to 4:28
FACT
Contrary to Dela Rosa’s statement, Canada — not the Philippines — has the longest coastline in the world, as cited in a report by the United Nations Environment Programme.
The North American country has a coastline of 243,042 kilometers, according to the Canadian government’s statistical office, which far outstrips the Philippines’ 36,289-kilometer-long coastline by about 200,000 kilometers.
Even among Asian countries, the Philippines still falls short behind Indonesia’s coastline of 54,720 kilometers.
A coastline is the “line that forms the boundary between the land and the ocean or a lake,” according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary.
The Philippines ranks sixth in the world with the longest coastline, according to the WORLD FACTBOOK, maintained by the United States government, and WorldAtlas.com, a Canada-based educational geography website.
Sources
CNN Philippines, The Source: Sen. Bato Dela Rosa, Nov. 27, 2019
United Nations Environment Programme, One year after the launch of #CleanSeas, the tide is turning, April 30, 2018
Statistics Canada, International perspective
National Commission for Culture and the Arts, Philippine Fast Facts
Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia in Washington D.C., Facts & Figures
Merriam-Webster Dictionary, Coastline
Central Intelligence Authority, FIELD LISTING :: COASTLINE
WorldAtlas.com, Countries With The Longest Coastline, last updated on June 18, 2018
(Guided by the code of principles of the International Fact-Checking Network at Poynter, VERA Files tracks the false claims, flip-flops, misleading statements of public officials and figures, and debunks them with factual evidence. Find out more about this initiative and our methodology.)
