Political
Relations between the Philippines and Malaysia are deep and longstanding, as the two countries are neighbors and ASEAN partners, and the Filipino and Malaysian peoples have interacted since time immemorial.
There have been high-level exchanges of visits in the recent years, notably the Official Visit of Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak on 14-16 October 2012, the State Visit of President Benigno S. Aquino III to Kuala Lumpur on 27-28 February 2014, and the Working Visit of Prime Minister Najib to Manila on 27 March 2014.
Formal diplomatic relations have been nurtured through the years ever since a Philippine legation was established in Kuala Lumpur in 1959. The Philippines-Malaysia Joint Commission on Bilateral Cooperation (JCBC), which was established in 1993 and later renamed as the Joint Commission Meeting (JCM), and other mechanisms further enhance cooperation in the political, economic, security, tourism, cultural and other fields.
The Joint Commission has met seven times - in 1993, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2006 and 2011.
The vibrancy of the Philippines-Malaysia relations are also manifested in the following:
- As of December 2013, Malaysia was the Philippines’ 11th largest trading partner, with total trade amounting to US$306.85 million. Philippine exports to Malaysia is valued at US$ 63.79 million and imports is valued at US$243.06 million.
- Malaysia is the Philippines’ 11th major tourist market, with 109,437 Malaysian tourists visiting the Philippines in 2013; on the other hand, 557,147 Filipinos visited Malaysia in 2013, making the Philippines the eighth major source of tourists for Malaysia.
- As of September 2013, Malaysian investments in the Philippines reached around US$2.3 billion over the last nine years (2005 to 2013).
- There is an increasing number of Philippine or Filipino-owned companies operating in Malaysia.
Both the Philippines and Malaysia are committed to enabling their partnership to reach full potential notwithstanding an outstanding territorial issue.
Together with Indonesia and Brunei, the Philippines and Malaysia are members of the BIMP-EAGA (East ASEAN Growth Area), a sub-regional grouping in ASEAN.