"Love the Philippines" logo

ACT Teachers Party-list Rep. France Castro prodded the Department of Tourism (DOT) on Tuesday, Aug. 15 to file charges against Doyle, Dane & Bernbach (DDB) Philippines--the contractor behind the fiasco that was the "Love the Philippines" tourism campaign. 

Castro, a House deputy minority leader and member of the Makabayan bloc, made this pitch to agency officials led by Secretary Christina Frasco during the budget hearing of DOT before the Committee on Appropriations. 

"Dapat magkaso tayo dito sa DDB. So would you pursue a case against sa DDB dito sa ginawa nilang plagiarism, trabahong tamad at misrepresentation? (We should file a case against DDB. So would you pursue a case against DDB for their shoddy, plagiarized work and misrepresentation?)" Castro asked the DOT officials. 

"As of the moment," replied Tourism Undersecretary Mae Ellaine Bathan, "As of the moment, the priority of the department was to immediately terminate and cancel the contract." 

"And one of the serious considerations also is the other courses of legal action including the filing of action in the proper courts should the same be warranted," noted Bathan, who is a lawyer. 

"But as we said, there was already a forfeiture of the performance bond as part of the penalty aside from the termination and cancelation, and the non-payment of any relative expenses that have been incurred relative to the project," the DOT official said. 

Castro said she was "disappointed" with Bathan's response. 

"Disappointed ako doon sa sagot kasi dapat file-an natin ito ng kaso, dapat mapag-usapan ng DOT na ma-file-an itong DDB ng kaso dahil sa kahihiyang idinulot nito sa atin (I'm disappointed with the answer because we need to file a case against them, the DOT should discuss the filing of charges against DDB for the embarrassment that it caused us)," she said. 

DDB Philippines earlier won the P49,9-million contract for the rebranded Philippine tourism campaign under Love the Philippines. 

It admitted to using stock footage from other countries like Indonesia, Thailand, Switzerland, and Dubai in the promotional video it put together for the campaign. This was only after the oblivious DOT launched it to much fanfare. 

2 branding department workers resign

In the same hearing, Bathan revealed that two DOT employees resigned as a result of the controversy. 

"There were already employees who formally tendered their resignations in lieu of the incident! Mr. Chair," she said. 

When asked by Castro to name these former employees, the undersecretary said: "For purposes of the privacy also of these persons, we're willing to submit these names. But they are already one or two of those who have already tendered their resignation and are no longer part of the department." 

However, the lady lawmaker was dismayed again when she learned that Bathan was only referring to contractual workers. 

"These are courtesy resignations that are tendered for those we have--their job in the branding department whose work we have contracted out as job order employees," Bathan told the appropriations panel. 

Bathan clarified that the contractual workers weren't the ones who gave the go signal for the release of the promotional video; rather, the decision was made by the DOT.