President Rodrigo Duterte told New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern that he already visited New Zealand two times. “I’d like to just mention in passing that at one time, I was proceeding to Peru [for 2016 APEC Leaders’ Meeting] and we had [an] overnight stop in Auckland.”
The President added that the first time was when he was still a congressman.
“I also once upon a time, many, many years ago, I was also a congressman and we had just this visitation of legislative bodies at that time,” he said. Duterte was Davao City First District Representative to Congress from 1998 to 2001.
He added that around 50,000 Filipinos are residing in Australia.
“I would say that they decided right because Auckland treats its citizens superbly,” he added. “No doubt about it. I was there.”
“New Zealand – is a country, small but was really governed well and protected well ahead of the time. And that is good. And you can see how it is now,” he said.
“It has flourished and about the only thing that’s lacking, I said, is you do not have the atom bombs there. You don’t have nuclear bases there. I suspect that you have none. I could not even see your police wearing guns,” Duterte added.