The unusual coverage of the “session” of the House of Representatives (HoR) at the Celebrity Sports Plaza by President Duterte’s official television crew is currently being investigated.
Presidential Broadcast Staff-Radio Television Malacanang (RTVM) executive director Dennis Wilfred Pabalan said they are looking into who deployed the RTVM crew to cover the House event outside the Batasan complex.
"Our tech crew (was) in HoR to cover the budget hearing. Crew were told to go Celebrity club instead," Pabalan said.
When asked who ordered the RTVM crew to move the new site, Pabalan said: “We’re still investigating.”
On Monday, RTVM provided broadcast coverage of the gathering of lawmakers at the Celebrity Sports Plaza where a new House Speaker was supposedly elected. The video of the House "session" as well as media interview of Marinduque Rep. Lord Allan Velasco were carried live on RTVM's Facebook page.
During the assembly, Velasco was elected new House Speaker replacing Alan Peter Cayetano. The Taguig lawmaker however has dismissed the supposed House session as illegal.
PBS-RTVM is the state agency mainly involved in the broadcast coverage and documentation of the activities of the President for news dissemination and video archives. It is one of the attached offices of the Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO).
In the past month, RTVM crew has been deployed to document the budget hearings at the House. The videos have been posted live on Facebook.