The money used for the promotional advertisement for “Love the Philippines” should be returned, former senator Richard Gordon said on Monday, July 3.                       Former Senator Richard Gordon  (MB File Photo)
Gordon, who is also a former tourism secretary, also criticized the use of stock footage for the advertisement which he said was obviously done with “very serious negligence.” “First of all, they should return the money…or at the very least correct the damage already done,” Gordon said in an interview on ABS-CBN News Channel. “You know, this is not the first time this happened. This is one mistake too many,” he added. Gordon recalled that when he came up with the “Wow, Philippines!” slogan when he was DOT secretary, he did not hire any advertising agency. “I could not make that same mistake because I was the one who made ‘Wow, Philippines.’ I did not hire any advertising agency,” he pointed out. “But if you do hire the services of an ad agency, you must be careful,” Gordon added. Gordon pointed out that when the slogan was replaced with “It’s More Fun in the Philippines,” “there is already a faux pas." “That was copied. If you Google it, you will find that the ad was already done by the Swiss in 1951 and it was adopted here. And we paid for it right? So that means we’re plagiarizing,” he pointed out. The same thing, he said, applies to latest promotional video: “We’re plagiarizing to a certain extent. We show a picture that does not belong to us. It shows: wala na ba kayong maipakita na maganda diyan? Sarili niyo bat kayo mangongopya pa? (Can’t you show anything else nice there? Why do you have to copy others)?” “Or at the very least, are you that stupid that you make such egregious error na hindi nyo binabantayan yung nilalagay niyo (that you don't know what you are putting into it). It shows that we are disrespectful to our profession,” Gordon lamented.

Carelessness, lack of diligence

Gordon also said there was clearly a case of carelessness and lack of diligence on the part of the DDB Philippines, the advertising agency contracted by the DOT, and by the DOT itself. “I suggest that the advertising agency be forthright. When they said they were not paid, I personally I won’t believe that. Certainly they are looking for an excuse,” he said. “We have enough destinations here that we can love here. We have rice terraces on our own. We can love our beaches, our Boracay and the Secretary of Tourism (Christina Frasco) is correct, on her speech on why we are in Conde Nast magazine for having the best beaches in the world. We have great dives here in the country, so there’s really no reason to copy,” he said. “It was carelessness! Lack of diligence to say the least,” added the former lawmaker. Sen. Grace Poe and Senate Minority Leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III also expressed their disappointment at the tourism slogan gaffe. “It has been said that there must be truth in advertising. It's frustrating to know that even the government can fall victim to blunders in a marketing campaign that supposedly aims to promote the Philippines' unique character, natural beauty and cultural attractions,” Poe said. “Para tayong na-scam sa advertisement na ito (It’s as if we were scammed in this advertisement). We expect the incident will not happen again especially to government agencies like the DOT that our people trust,” she said. Pimentel also said he finds it “very disappointing due to the very unprofessional work using stock video footages.” “Love the Philippines is the idea yet we were proudly showing Indonesian Thai Swiss and Emirati tourist attractions,” Pimentel said. “Anyway, we want to be a friend to all nations. Hence maybe that is our expression of our friendliness to all nations. We promote them also in our promotional videos about the Philippines,” he said.