SENATORS appalled by Presidential Assistant Secretary Mocha Uson’s disastrous effort to promote federalism through a controversial video featuring a lewd “pepedederalismo” jingle asked the Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) to justify its huge budget.
This, as Uson’s boss, PCOO Secretary Martin M. Andanar, said in a radio interview that Executive Secretary Salvador C. Medialdea had told him to exclude Uson from the planned information campaign, following the uproar created by the video where she and a blogger friend discussed federalism, and the latter stood up and sang the jingle, with suggestive actions as he played on the words pepe and dede by repeating the first two syllables of the Filipino word for federalism, pederalismo.
Blogger Drew Olivar touched his chest and groin while singing pepe and dede, the Filipino slang terms for a woman’s genitals and breast. An amused Uson stood watching.
Senate President Vicente C. Sotto III reminded the Palace official that federalism is a “serious issue” and should not be taken lightly.
Sen. Aquilino L. Pimentel III admitted he erred in expecting Uson could help promote federalism. “I was wrong,” said former Senate President Pimentel.
Sen. Francis G. Escudero saw Uson’s production of the pepedederalismo video as “vulgar and out of place” in whatever forum tackling federalism.
Sen. Emmanuel J. Joel Villanueva deplored the pepedederalismo video as “a big insult to the intelligence of the people,” deploring it was not the kind of public information material he expected from an official .
Sen. Nancy S. Binay, who earlier sought to summon Uson so she can explain her plans to disseminate information on federalism, could not hide her dismay. She said it should be clear to all that the federalism issue is “not an amusement piece or comedy material.”
For her part, Sen. Grace Poe noted that several agencies are getting deep cuts in their budget in the proposed appropriations for 2019. While these agencies will suffer a slash, the PCOO will be gifted with a P100-million increase, she said.
Poe asserted that the PCOO must justify its budget increase. “What are the deliverables? Are memes and blogs also hit by inflationary spikes? Is the cost of feeding the nation with government information adversely affected by TRAIN, too? Will the PCOO be hiring campaigners to explain federalism?”
Palace explains
Following the backlash on the controversial video, Malacañang said this is not the way it wanted to promote Charter change.
In a radio interview, Presidential Spokesman Harry L. Roque Jr. said Uson may have had good intentions, and she may have achieved it, but he said this is not how they wanted to raise awareness on federalism.
“What we wanted was for the people to understand what is federalism and how will it benefit their daily lives so that they will support Charter change,” Roque said in a mix of English and Filipino.
Roque said he is one of those involved in the federalism information drive, which he earlier said initially costs P90 million.
Earlier, Con-com Chairman and former Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno announced that it was the President who will be forming the intergovernmental group in charge of promoting federalism across the country. Puno said this group will be headed by Medialdea and Roque.
In a press briefing, Andanar said Medialdea also expressed displeasure on talk that Uson will be the official spokesman on federalism.
“The decision to give authority to Asec. Mocha did not come from the interagency. It came from the [Con-com] Spokesperson Ding Generoso,” Andanar said, noting that Generoso talked to Uson without informing the interagency and him as head of the PCOO.
That is why he said he confronted Generoso yesterday morning and told him to “disengage” talks with Uson because of the issue.
He also said that, so far, what they have talked about on the communication strategy of federalism is that the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) will head the content creation of the federalism campaign, while the PCOO will manage the distribution of content.
Generoso said in a statement it was “unfortunate” that sort of video was posted on the day before their meeting last Friday together with the DILG communications group to discuss how she could help in the information drive.
He said they envisioned an information campaign focusing on federalism’s benefits and the economic growth it will bring across all regions.
He also clarified that Uson was not designated as spokesman for federalism and that having a particular spokesman for federalism is not part of the information dissemination program.